Listen
by AndImTheQueenOfSheba
Summary: After the ordeal with her stepbrother, Miley's family moves back to Tennessee, where she tries to keep her secret, a secret...but her quest to stay secretive ends quickly. Sequel to Speak.
1. Chapter 1

**_Helloo everyone. Said I was leaving this account, but here I am, a year and a half and 11 new stories later. At one point I'd planned on redoing this story...If you haven't noticed there are about 5000 typos. BUT I completely forgot about that, and went on to my new account (link's in my profile, if you haven't discovered it yet) where I actually redid Speak for the...third time? I redid the first chapter of this one, but I never got around to redoing the rest, so here I am. Hopefully it's much better now..._**

Corn.

And more corn.

Nothing but Corn.

Corn corn corn corn.

All I see out this stupid window is corn, for hours and hours and hours. Once in a while a telephone poll or some houses would speckle my view of the boring back roads my dad insisted on taking, claiming they were safer , but anything other than the yellow vegetable was a rare sight.

You'd think we hadn't left the Midwest yet. The drive from our last house in Illinois to the new one in Tennessee was only a 5 hour drive, but you'd think it's 50. With nothing that I actually want to remember to occupy my mind, it seems like everything is moving so much slower. For the first time in a long time, life wasn't speeding by, in a blur, It was taking it's sweet time, boring me half to death. I felt like we were moving in slow motion, watching the speedometer rise and fall from my spot in the back seat, anxiously. I wanted to get there already, so I could lay down and sulk in my new bedroom, and _not _miss anything about my last home, or the one before it, or the one before that.

I let out a huge sigh, and my dad answered it, fed up with my dismal mood,

"Oh come on Miley, I know you don't want to move, but it's for the better. Did you really want to stay in Cairo?"

"I had friends there." I deadpanned, not bothering to put any emphasis on a phrase I'd repeated too many times. Linda, my stepmother, turned around in her seat, and tried to cheer me up, with little success.

"You had a lot of enemies too, sweetie." I oftentimes questioned whether or not she was really trying to cheer me up, because she never did a very good job of it.

Ignoring them, I turned to the little boy sitting in the car seat next to me, and commented,

"Daken doesn't want to move either."

"I'm sure he doesn't, but he can't talk, so his vote doesn't count." My dad replied with a chuckle, like everything was okay, and we were a happy, normal, family again. We weren't. I wasn't _normal_. I wasn't _happy._ They were a happy, normal family, I was not a part of that.

They thought I was over it, and I'd thought that too, for a while, but lately, I'd been spending time in my bleak, stark white bedroom, - which we'd never bothered to paint - thinking about it. The crack in the ceiling was what did it. My old bedroom had one just like it, and my eyes had been fixated on it countless times, while my mind was trying not to think about what was happening to me. It wasn't something I wanted to relive. There was absolutely nothing in my life that I wanted to relive anymore. The bad had so thickly covered the good, so that now when I thought of a good memory, I remembered what happened that night, or the next day, and it was completely ruined.

I tried to forget about it, but I couldn't seem to do it. Everybody was getting impatient, secretly wishing I would quit hibernating in my bedroom, only causing my depression to worsen. I couldn't do that. I wanted to...but for me, forgetting was not an option. My memory refused to let anything go. It was locked shut, and I'd swallowed the key.

"I'll teach him sign language. Then he can protest." I mumbled, once my voice had come back to me, too late.

Nobody said anything, so, sighing, I looked out the window again. I slowly stroked the dog -who was cutting off the circulation in my legs- 's back, staring out at nothing.

After what truly seemed like forever, the truck finally came upon a town. It was tiny, but at least there was no corn. There's none of it in sight, as far as I can see.

Dad stopped the truck in front of a grocery store, and dug through the console for his wallet.

"You probably don't wanna go grocery shopping with us, so why don't you take Daken for a walk or something?" He said, keeping his eyes down the whole time, as he checked his wallet for money.

"Ok. Sure. Whatever." I spat, yanking the straps on Daken's car seat off, wondering if maybe this was just an excuse for them to be alone to talk about me and how I wasn't getting better, and _maybe moving wasn't the right thing to do_.

I gently removed him from his car seat and climbed out of the truck, placing him on my hip once my feet were on the ground.

"Take your phone. Don't talk to strangers. Don't steal anything, and don't kill anybody." My dad advised, thinking he was funny.

I rolled my eyes and mumbled,

"I'll be sure to do that."

Dad didn't say anything, he just disappeared with Linda into the disgusting run-down grocery store, which looked to be about a week away from condemnation. I wouldn't be surprised if there were rats in the food.

Daken and I headed down the cracked sidewalk, which wasn't even existent in some places. Eventually, without me twisting my ankle or dying or anything, we came upon a park. Well, the sign said it was a park. If you ask me, it looked more like a graveyard of old playground equipment from the thirties.

There was a rusty slide, a swing set, which actually looked relatively safe, and an empty swimming pool that looked like it had been attacked by the Loch Ness monster.

Off to the side of the playground was a square of cracked cement, covered in dirt, getting sucked into the earth. It had a rusty basketball hoop on each side, both of which were missing the nets, and whose backboards were no longer white, due to the paint chipping off, and appeared about ready to fall over. The park was pretty much empty, except for several boys playing basketball, and a little girl, who couldn't be any older than six, swinging on the squeaky, rust covered swings, all by herself. I would usually wonder where her parents were, but in this town it didn't come as much of a surprise that the children were neglected as much as the playground was.

Daken ran over to the "basketball court", where there was a large pile of sand, and sat down in it. I wasn't sure if I should go drag him out of it, considering I didn't know what kind of things hid in the sand, but I let him play in it anyway. I can't protect myself, how can I be expected to protect him?

I followed him over to the sand pile, to make sure he didn't eat any of the sand, and stood awkwardly near him, feeling the eyes of the boys playing basketball boring into my back.

I guess this pile of dirt is supposed to be a sand box, minus the box. I couldn't say this is the best place to put it, what with a basketball court right next to it.

Daken dug in the sand for a good five minutes, before the boys' basketball came flying toward him. I caught it on a bounce right before it hit him, and tossed it, what I thought was lightly, back to the boys. _Somehow, _by some miracle_,_ or just a random act of God, it made it through the hoop. All four -I counted- of the boys looked just as shocked as I felt. One of them caught the ball and tossed it to one of his friends.

"Good shot" Said the boy, as he came up to the sandbox, where Daken and I stood, minding our own business.

"Thanks." I mumbled, not in the mood to talk to this guy. I was too depressed to take compliments seriously, at the moment.

"Do you play basketball or something?" He asked me, trying to start a conversation, when I was trying to end one.

"Oh, no. I suck at sports. I barely passed P.E." I told him, unable to shut up when I had told myself I wasn't going to talk to him anymore.

"I find that hard to believe." He told me, running his hand through his sweaty, dirty blonde hair with a look on his face that told me he wasn't going away any time soon.

"Well, it's true." I assured him, trying to keep my end of the conversation to a minimal.

"Oh, I'm Avery" He told me, his hands resting on his hips as he breathed heavily from his game of basketball. "Oh, uh, Swank, yeah, sorry, I forgot my last name for a minute there." He rambled nervously, with an expectant smile on his face.

"Miley Stewart." I told him, figuring I should at least give him an introduction. I could've used a fake name, but my brain was focused on one thing, and that was not alternate identities.

Avery nodded, just as Daken stood up and started strangling my leg, squeezing it to tell me he was bored and wanted to do something else. I ruffled his hair, and he reached up for me with his tiny little sticky hands. I picked him up and rested him on my hip, to occupy him, but it didn't seem to be his idea of fun, so he started sticking his fingers in my ear, and pulling my hair, smiling his little face off all the while.

"Hey!" I exclaimed, pulling his finger out of my right ear.

Avery stood there, watching us. I wasn't talking, hoping he'd take a hint and go away, but he didn't.

"Is this your brother?"

"Half brother." I answered, holding Daken's hands away from my head with my free arm.

"You're moving into the old farmhouse on the corner of Bunker Hill and Crosby, right?" Avery suddenly asked, surprising me by how much he knew now that he knew my name.

"Umm, yeah...how did you know that?" I asked, a little freaked out.

"Oh I know everybody's business here." He must've seen the scared look on my face, because he then added,

"I'm not, like, a spy...just, in a town this small everybody knows everything about everyone...plus I live like, two houses down from you." I swallowed so much of the moisture in my mouth that it felt like a desert. Everything about everyone? _Great._

"Hey, once you're moved in...do you wanna, like, go see a movie or something? I mean, you probably don't really know anybody, so maybe you'd want to meet some people? I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't...I just thought, maybe...you know..." I wanted to say no, but then I thought about it. Maybe it would be a good idea to get out and meet people. It might take my mind off of...other things.

I pulled a pen out of my purse and wrote my number on his hand, as my answer.

"Call me Friday and I'll see when I'm free, ok?" He smiled, looking surprised by the disappearance of my bad mood, and replied,

"I gotta go, see you around." He took off after his friends, who had thought it funny to leave while he was talking to me. I watched him disappear for a moment, holding Daken up against my chest, until a horn honked, startling me. I spun around, to see that it was my dad.

I set Daken back down, and held his hand as we made our way back to the car.

"Who was that?" My dad asked me, the second I opened the door.

"One of our neighbors, I guess." I replied, buckling Daken into his car seat. and climbing in after him.

"I'm glad you met somebody here already." Linda said, turning around in her seat, to ruffle Daken's hair. He smiled at her and his mouth opened, but no words came out.

I leaned against the window and stared at the dog, not wanting to see out the window anymore. I'd seen about enough of the town I was now living in. We drove in silence for several more minutes, until dad turned onto a gravel road, and slowed down.

"We're almost there!" He exclaimed, happily. I didn't understand his enthusiasm, but when he pulled into the driveway, I _definitely _didn't understand it.

The house was a piece of crap, simple as that. It was in major need of a paint job, what was left of the shutters were hanging off the windows, the shingles on the roof were falling apart, the gutters were barely hanging on, and the fricking door was missing.

"With all the Hannah money you couldn't get something with a door?" I asked my dad, trying not to say anything mean. Dad obviously thought there was something special about this place.

"I didn't use the Hannah money. That's yours."

"No it's not. It's Hannah's. As far as I'm concerned, Hannah's dead, so it all goes to her manager, who refuses to use it on useful things like doors."

"Hannah isn't dead, Miley. You know I would gladly call the record company if you wanted to start singing again." Dad told me. He loved it when I was Hannah. He got a lot more attention that way. He had actually met Linda through Hannah. Linda had been one of the people involved in a commercial I'd made a long time ago. Anymore I couldn't remember the product I'd been advertising.

I didn't say anything for a minute, and thought about that. Maybe starting over was exactly what I needed.

"You know what, maybe you should." I replied, with a smile. I kind of, in the back of my mind, missed being Hannah. It had been exhilarating while it had lasted. And Hannah had body guards. Nothing bad could happen to Hannah the way it had to me.

Dad's voice brought me back from my Hannah memories, as he started talking about the _house?_ I wasn't so sure that was the right word for it. Maybe dilapidated shack, or crappy house-shaped stack of wood.

"Well, the house is safe, I had the insurance company look at it. We'll be using the first floor for a while, while the second floor is getting redone, so don't take anything up to your room yet." It's not like I knew which room was mine anyway. This had been all dad and Linda. I'd stayed out of it. I hadn't cared in the least. It wasn't like the house made much of a difference in how much of a freak I was.

I nodded in reply, and stared at the house, while dad and Linda started unloading the U-Haul, starting with the big furniture.

It's a pretty scary house. It's straight out of a horror movie, simple as that. Then again, my life _is_ a horror movie. Maybe I do belong here.


	2. Chapter 2

**_The authors notes in this story are really starting to freak me out. I hope I didn't really talk that way back then..._**

**_Anyway, here we go. _:)**

I lie awake in a sleeping bag on the floor.

I don't know why I'd woke up. I'd been having a dream. About Jake. It's nothing unusual, I'd been having dreams about him every single night since we moved from Malibu, which was almost three years ago.

Normally, loud noises wake you in the middle of the night. Not for me. Silence woke me up. Complete silence. No breathing, no snoring, no crickets, no creaking floorboards. Nothing.

I slid out of my sleeping bag, which made absolutely no sound at all, adding to the creepiness.

My stomach was grumbling, like it did every night. I couldn't hear it, but I definitely felt it, so I headed to the "kitchen", and opened the "fridge", which in all reality was just an ice chest. I took a popsicle, which was completely melted by now, since there was no ice left, and opened it with my teeth.

I didn't know how a popsicle could make you thirsty, but apparently can, so I grabbed the nearest glass and filled it at the sink. It made no noise at all, and I paid a whole lot more attention to that than to the brownish tint of the water.

_It's all a dream. It's just a dream. _I told myself.

My dream self took a drink, and rested the glass on the counter, keeping my fingers wrapped around it tightly.

Suddenly, there were footsteps coming from uptairs, and the noise surprised me so much, I let go of the glass, and it fell to the floor with a loud _nothing._

Since the footsteps coming from upstairs were a little more of a pressing matter, I ignored the shattered glass and went up the normally creaky, but temporarily silent, stairs, ignoring Horror Movie Rule #1.

When you hear strange sounds, do not investigate! Yeah, so much for that.

I looked around when I got to the top, and saw nothing, so I peaked into each of the rooms.

The window was open in the one at the end, which I'd been told happened to be mine, and the curtain was blowing in the breeze. I entered the room to close it, and when I turned around, the door was shut.

_It's just a dream, it's only a dream._

I quickly ran downstairs, to clean up the glass and hide in my sleeping bag until I woke up in the morning, but when I got to the kitchen, the glass had disappeared.

My eyes expanded to something around the size of tennis balls, I'm sure, and I turned off the lights and ran back to my _bed_, shutting my eyes as hard as I could.

Before I knew it, it was morning and I'd woken up again, to the sound of birds chirping, and my dad unpacking food.

I pulled my long messy hair into a pony tail and entered the kitchen, but before I could say "Good morning" He had me carrying in boxes of clothes.

I now realized that it was a good thing I'd thrown out almost all of Hannah's clothes, otherwise, this would be torture.

When I came back into the house and set down the last box, my dad handed me a plate with two fried eggs and three slices of bacon on it.

He handed me a spoon and picked up his own plate, digging into his egg right away.

"A spoon?" I asked, staring at the eating utensil, confused.

"I can't find the forks."

"Don't you normally pack silverware together?"

"Normally, you do, but normal doesn't exactly decribe us."

"You got that right." I agreed, leaning against the ancient counter top, trying for several minutes to eat my eggs with a spoon, but giving up and eating the bacon first instead.

As I chewed the last strip, Daken came running into the kitchen to hug my dad. Dad picked him up and set his plate down on the counter, before giving a piece of a strip of bacon to him.

Linda soon follows, running her fingers through her straight, shoulder length blonde hair.

"How'd you sleep?" She asked me, running her hand across my back as she entered the room.

"Okay I guess. I had a really weird nightmare though."

"Does it involve you smashing a glass on the floor in the kitchen?" Dad asked, kicking the garbage can with his foot. It made a rattling sound, from the glass shards inside of it, no doubt.

"Yes..." I mumbled, tearing off a piece of my egg with my fingers, since the spoon was not sufficing.

"You forgot to clean it up." He said, handing Daken to Linda so that he could finish his breakfast.

"Oh...I must've been sleepwalking again." I told him, although I wasn't so sure that that was what I'd been doing.

"Well, don't do it again, I don't need you burning down the house in your sleep." He said, smiling. A single spark and this place would be up in flames. It wouldn't take any effort from me.

I finished my breakfast and went upstairs to look around, since I hadn't been up there yet. My breath caught in my throat as I realized that it looked exactly how it had in my dream. Even my bedroom, where the ugly curtain was caught in the window.

"That was some freakishly accurate dream." I muttered to myself, turning around to see the dog sitting right behind me, staring right at me, or rather, through me. I moved to the side, and he continued staring at the same spot, almost as if I weren't even there.

"Looks like I'm not the only psycho one in this family." I told him, rubbing the dog between his ears before making my way downstairs to finish unpacking.

Friday came surprisingly quickly, and just as I had expected, my phone started ringing the second I had stepped into the shower. With my shoes on, I might add. There was no way in hell that I was touching that mold, or whatever it was, with my bare feet.

I tried to hop out of the shower to grab my phone - which I'd taken into the bathroom with me, by force of habit - but slipped and hit my side on the edge of the bath tub really hard and fell over the side, onto the floor.

"Oww..." I moaned, pulling myself up off the ground. The phone kept ringing, so I slowly hobbled to the sink to answer it.

"Hello?" I say, letting the pain show in my voice.

"Uh, Hi, Miley, it's Avery...this isn't a bad time is it?"

"No, not at all...I just sorta fell out of the shower."

"Fell out of the shower?"

"Yeah...it's a lot more painful and a lot less funny than it sounds."

"Okay, well, I was calling to see if you wanted to go to the drive in with me tonight. We all hang out there all the time, so you might get to meet some of the guys...and girls, they hang out there too, just they always watch the stupid movies, so we don't see them as much..."

"Sure, that sounds good. What time?" I asked, looking down at my side, half-expecting to see bones sticking out. They weren't. It was hardly even red.

"How about I pick you up at six?" He offered.

"Sounds good, I'll see you then."

"Great. See you later." He replied, hanging up without actually saying goodbye.

I hung up after him and set my phone on the toilet set, before successfully getting back into the shower without hurting myself.

When I told my dad about the date, he of course, being him, refused to let me go until he met Avery. I argued with him for almost fifteen minutes, and lost. Unhappily, I went back to arranging the last of the boxes by room, which took forever, seeing as we had a whole lot of junk we didn't actually need.

I looked at the time on my phone after a whole lot of effort moving boxes by myself, with many thanks to my father, and saw that it was 4:52. I hurried to the bathroom to start getting ready. I dug a nice - hardly even wrinkled - dress out of one of the boxes, and put it on, not liking the way it looked on me, but knowing I wasn't going to like anything else either. At about 5:30, I went back to the bathroom to do my hair and makeup.

When I came back into the "living room" at exactly 5:58, my dad was looking out the window.

"Well, it looks like he stood you up, how about you get get your PJs on and we have some hot chocolate?"

"_Dad!_" I complained halfheartedly, staring out the window with him.

He laughed and put his arm around me, before saying,

"Now remember, keep your clothes on, don't run off and get married, don't take anything from his friends, and if he does that yawn and stretch, arm around the shoulder thing, find the closest smoothie and dump it on his head!"

"Oh, come on daddy." I say, lightly slapping him on the shoulder.

"Hey! Those are_ good _rules!"

The gravel out front crunches, and my dad shoots to the window.

"He's here!"

"You know what, you seem more excited about this date then me, why don't you go out with him!"

Avery climbs out of his truck, and knocks on the makeshift door.

My dad opened it and in less than a second, he had Avery in the house and was giving him his list of "rules."

"Just remember, I'll be watching you...and if you don't have her back by 9...I have a gun."

Avery looked truly scared, so I assured him,

"He's joking."

"Not about the gun. I saw one in the barn...I just don't know how to use it." Dad said with a smile.

"Daddy, do me a favor. Stop talking and get out of here!"

He chuckled and joined Linda and Daken in the kitchen, leaving Avery and me in the living room. Avery escorted me out of the house, and on the way to his truck, he said nervously,

"You're dad seems a little..."

"Overprotective?" I offer.

"Yeah."

"He's more worried you'll murder me than anything else."

"Really?" Avery asked wth a smile, showing his perfectly straight, shiny teeth.

"Yeah, after what happened three years ago, he knows I wouldn't do anything he doesn't approve of." I explain, climbing into his truck and realizing too late what I'd said.

"What happened three years ago?" He asked, truly interested.

"Oh,I uhh...My step mom...when she had Daken there were a lot of problems...It was a nasty sight, believe me. I told my dad I never wanted to have kids after that." I lied, making up a crappy explanation for the words that had come out of my mouth without my meaning to say them.

He started the engine and put the truck in reverse, backing out of the driveway.

"You don't?" He asked, curiously.

"I don't know...Maybe I'll might change my mind. "Can we talk about something else?"

"Ok, what's your favorite vegetable?"

"My favorite _vegetable?" _I repeat the question. "Umm, whatever isn't green."

"You don't eat green things?" Avery asked, obviously thinking it was strange.

"Nope. Donuts too. I hate them."

"I've never heard somebody say that before. That's almost un-American."

"Well how do you know it's supposed to be green? When food goes bad, it turns green, so for all you know, when you think you're eating broccoli, it could be spoiled caulliflower."

"I've never thought of it that way..." He says quietly, and I'm sure I've convinced him I'm a freak.

He's silent for a minute, before asking,

"So where did you move from?"

I sighed, and started from the beginning.

"Well, I grew up not too far from here. I've got a lot of family in Crowley Corners. When I was 11, we moved to Malibu."

"Ooh, Malibu? It must be nice there." He interrupted.

"Yeah, it wasn't too bad." I lied. "After that, we moved to New York, and then Arizona, and then Cairo. The one in Illinois, not Egypt. We moved here from there."

"So...you probably won't be staying here too long, will you?" he asked, showing a little disappointment.

"I'll be 18 in four months. If I wanted to, I could stay. I think we'll be here for a while though. We're all pretty tired of moving."

"Well, here's your reason to stay. The _glorious_ Sunrise Drive In" He kids as he turns onto a small gravel road, leading up to a gate, with a booth on the left side where they I assumed were selling the tickets.

"Sounds more like a restaurant than a movie theater." I stated, remembering a diner with that name that I'd gone to once or twice back in Malibu.

"Yeah, well there was a restaurant named Sunrise...but they kept getting calls from people asking when the next showing of Harry Potter was, so they changed the name." He told me as he handed his money to the redheaded woman in the ticket booth.

I looked at him and saw the completely serious look on his face.

"Seriously?" I asked, as he pulled forward into the large field that was the Sunrise Drive-in Movie Theater

"Completely." He answers, smiling while he searches for a good place to park. He found one in the back, and got out of the truck, coming over to my side to open the door before I even had my seatbelt unbuckled.

"Ready?" He asked me, taking my hand as I climbed out.

"Completely." I answered.


	3. Chapter 3

The image on the screen brought tears to my eyes.

I tried to hold them back, keeping my eyes closed tightly, but it was as if I could see right through my eyelids. Avery must've heard my sobbing, because he turned to me and asked,

"What's wrong?"

I paused amidst the conversation going on around me, which included opinions such as,

"This is the first movie he's done that didn't invlove the words teen or high. I'm surprised, I thought he'd be playing teenage werewolfs until he was eighty."

I pointed at the giant head on the screen, and said,

"That's my ex."

He gave me a sceptical look, and asked me,

"You went out with _Jake Ryan?_"

"Yeah, I also, dumped a smoothie on his head." I told him, smiling a little through my tears. I wiped my eyes on the back of my hand, smearing my mascara.

"Oh, so you listen to your dad's rules when it comes to movie stars?" He asked, laughing slightly.

"I listen to my dads rules all the time." I assured him. "Well, some of them."

"I don't believe you." He said, and now I was pretty sure he was talking about Jake again.

I dug through my purse and pulled out my camera. I searched through the pictures, and easily found the one I was looking for. I'd taken a grand total of about five pictures in the course of three years, so it didn't take much.

This was a picture of me leaning against Jake at my lawyer's office. He had his arm around me and his lips to the top of my head. My dad had taken it when we weren't looking, and it was my second favorite picture, coming in after one of me and my mother.

I showed him the picture and he looked surprised.

"You look a lot different now. How long ago was this?"

"Almost three years." I answered, running my middle finger along the bottom of my eye, trying to fix my smearing makeup as much as I could.

I turned my attention back to the movie, when it zoomed in on Jake again and another tear rolled down my cheek, ruining that.

"You wanna go do something else?" Avery whispered.

"Would that be ok?" I asked him, sniffling.

"It's fine, I didn't really like this movie anyways." He assured me. I was pretty sure he was lying.

We got back in his truck and drove to the nearest Dairy Queen, where we found a booth in the back.

Almost as if he had read my mind, Avery ordered my favorite ice cream and set it down on the table in front of me.

"I'm really sorry." I told him, wrapping two of my fingers around the spoon.

"It's fine." He assured me, taking a bite of his Blizzard.

"No, it's not. It's just...I don't know. This is probably really weird for you. I didn't think I was still so...hung up on it. It's just a really..._confusing _situation. I wouldn't know how to even start explaining it."

"You don't have to."

"Good." I replied, and we sat in silence for a few minutes.

"_So_...are you gonna go to school here in the fall?" He asked me, pushing his spoon in and out of his ice cream.

"No. I got my GED when I was 15."

"Why?" He asked, his tone of voice slightly surprised.

"What do you mean, why?"

"Well, normally, when you graduate early like that, it's either because you're a famous rock star, you have a mile long criminal record, or you had a baby or something."

I was completely silent for a minute, my face glued into an emotionless expression.

"I just got sick of school, that's all." I said, smiling a little.

"Oh." He smiled too, took a bite of his ice cream, looked up, and frowned.

"Oh no..."

He leaned over his ice cream and looked down, trying not to be seen by somebody.

"What, are you embarassed to be seen with me or something?" I asked, turning around to see who he was hiding from and seeing nobody suspicious.

"No, not at all."

"Then why are you hiding?" I asked, pulling away the menu he had in front of his face.

"To protect you."

"To _protect _me? From who?" I asked, utterly confused.

"Psycho ex-girlfriend. If she sees me with you, she might pull your hair out...or your tongue."

"What?" She can't be _that_ bad." I said, rolling my eyes.

"Oh, she can. Believe me. I have a bald spot, a couple of scars, and no chest hair thanks to her."

I laughed to myself, thinking of Oliver.

Out of nowhere, a tall girl with jet black hair, wearing a jacket over a Waitress's uniform that said,

"Welcome to Susie's, my name is Tally." on the name tag pinned to it, appeared next to our table.

"Avery! It's _so _great to see you!" She said, grinning.

Tally turned to me and frowned.

"Who's this?" She asked unenthusiastically.

"My sister!" He exclaimed without taking a second to think about it.

I tried to hide a smile.

"Avery, we went out for two months, I think I'd know if you had a...totally hot sister."

This waitress did _not _just hit on me.

"She's my step-sister! Mom got married." She gave him the same sceptical look he had given me earlier, and he continued.

"In Africa...to a CIA agent...a _very shy_ CIA agent...that's why you didn't hear about it."

She seemed to believe it, and started flirting with him right in front of me.

I leaned back in my chair and just smiled at him as he looked at me, completely helpless.

I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, so I pulled it out, a more perfect distraction than I could have asked for.

"Lilly?" I answered. Tally looked at me, winked, and turned back to her conversation about the Save the Whales Foundation.

I almost threw up.

"Hey, what's up?" Lilly asked, as I held my finger up to excuse myself from the table.

"I'm on a date." I replied, wandering over to the opposite side of the dining area.

"Oh, I didn't mean to interrupt, I can call back later..."

"Oh no, it's fine. He's trying to get rid of his very flirtacious psycho ex. It'll be a while."

"She's flirting with him in front of you?"

"She's notjustflirting with him_._" I told her, glancing back at the table, where Tally had taken my chair.

"That's awkward..." Lilly said. "Well what's it like out there?"

"Kinda creepy. The house looks like it's straight out of a horror movie. When I get home, I'll send you a picture."

"Creepy?" She asked, and I explained my dream to her. She was silent for a moment.

"Lilly?" I asked, making sure she was still there.

"Yeah...sorry. That just reminds me a lot of this Lifetime movie I saw the other day. Maybe you weren't actually dreaming..."

"Lilly, it was a dream. It couldn't possibly be anything else."

"Well, how did you know what the upstairs looked like if you hadn't been up there before?" She asked me.

"I don't know, but I do know it wasn't real. Stuff like that doesn't happen."

"It does in horror movies." Lilly assured me.

"Yeah, but this isn't a movie, Lilly."

"What if somebody died there! Have you seen any blood?"

"Only my own." I told her, annoyance showing in my voice.

"How'd you get your blood on something already?"

"Paper cut. No big deal." I told her, glancing down at the tiny slice in my finger I'd gotten while unpacking.

"I bet a ghost did it." She said, not sounding quite so serious anymore.

"Yeah Lilly. I'm sure you're right." I told her sarcastically.

"Umm, by the way...are you still taking those pills every night?" She asked quietly, and I realized sombody must've been there with her.

"Lilly, if I didn't, I would probably commit suicide in my sleep, you know that." I replied, at the same volume.

"I just wanted to make sure. I don't want anything to happen to you."

"Nothing is going to happen to me Lilly. I'm fine." It wasn't entirely a lie...

"I miss you." She told me, her voice quiet again.

"I miss you too Lilly. You'll have to come out here when we get all moved in. I haven't seen you in forever."

"I think it's been a year since we've seen each other face to face."

"Oh my gosh. You have no choice then. You _have _to come out, even if I have to kidnap you." I decided out loud, realizing just how long it had really been since I'd had a halfway normal life.

"You won't have to kidnap me." She said happily.

"Good. But for now I have to go."

"Oliver wanted to talk to you too...but he can wait." Lilly said, and I could hear her laughing at him in the background.

"Tell him I'll call him later tonight. I'll talk to you later, and I'll definitely _see _you soon. Both of you."

"Wait! I forgot to ask, what's his name and what does he look like?" Lilly asked, just as I was about to hang up.

"His name's Avery." I told her, crossing the room to take over my newly empty chair. "I'll send you a picture. Bye Lilly."

I snapped the phone shut and looked up at Avery, smiling apologetically.

"Sorry!"

...

Once I got home, I looked around for my dad, and couldn't find him, so I went searching upstairs. Daken was sitting on the floor in the hall, playing with one of his toys all by himself. I picked him up and rested him on my hip, when I saw that the bathroom door was the bathroom, my dad was standing and talking with Linda and some guy I'd never seen before in my life.

The second I entered the bathroom, I felt strange. The happiness I'd been feeling when I'd arrived home was suddenly gone, and now I stood in the bathroom, depressed and shivering from the cold.

I studied the guy my dad was talking to, even though I knew that he knew I was looking at him. He looked like he was maybe a year or two older then me. He had black hair, a little shorter than I remembered Oliver's being, and in need of a good shampooing. His eyes were so dark brown they almost looked black. He stared right back at me, and I got colder.

I couldn't stand to be in the room any longer, so I backed into the doorway, holding Daken up against my chest. He kept pushing the buttons on the toy phone he had in his hands. It usually made noise, but we had quickly figured out that its batteries needed to be removed, when he'd decided it was his favorite toy. He still found a lot of joy in just pushing the buttons though.

"This is Jason. He's gonna help us renovate the house."

I just nodded, and Jason held his hand out. I wasn't sure I wanted to shake it, and I could easily use the holding a small child excuse. I was almost positive my body would turn to stone if I touched him. He stared at me, and his dark, depressing eyes made me take his hand. Still, I freed one hand and quickly shook it, and was surprised to find that his hand was warm.

They went back to talking about where they wanted the toilet when they redid the bathroom, so I went back downstairs. I left Daken and his toy phone in his play pen with a blanket, and went to the bathroom to take my pill and change into my pajamas. I checked on Daken once more, and found him asleep. I quietly pulled the blanket over him and went to bed myself, where I was dead asleep within five minutes.

_Two months later_

He had me pressed against the wall, but this was completely voluntary, and I wanted it this way. He wasn't a psychopathic freak. He wasn't my stepbrother.

His right hand was around my waist, and his left was on the side of my head, his fingers slowly moving through my hair. His mouth moved from mine, to my neck, and his right hand slid down a little farther to my leg. I was actually thinking, for a split second, about letting him continue, but I saw my watch out of the corner of my eye and pushed him away.

"I have to go...and you know I don't go further than that." I told him, smiling despite the disappointed look on his face.

"_Fine." _He complained. "Are you gonna tell me where you've been going for the last three weeks?"

"No." I told him, squeezing his hand tightly before letting go and digging my keys out of my pocket.

He gave me a knowing look, and I sighed.

"It's kind of personal." He just blinked at me. "You don't have to worry about it. I'll tell you eventually. I'm just not...ready."

"You're not ready for anything." He mumbled, rolling his eyes.

I ran my fingers through my hair, trying to straighten it out a little, before I climbed into my car, waved goodbye, and drove away, heading to my first photoshoot in over three years.


	4. Chapter 4

"Lean back further!" The photographer, who spoke with a strangely annoying accent, that sounded neither Austrailian nor British, but a mix between the two, yelled impatiently.

I did as he told me and then moved my right hand away from the space between the two silver spray painted crates they had me laying on.

"Pu' your 'ead back!! Like...you been stabbed in the neck!" The British Austrailian man yelled over the sound of the camera taking pictures.

I put my head back like he said, but apparently, it wasn't far enough, for he soon yelled,

"Further 'annah! and open your damn mouth! You look like you 'wallowed a slug!"

I angrily opened my mouth and pretended to curl the corners into a smile, while he took pictures like it was going out of style.

Of the many adjectives you could use to describe Nigel Flemming, none of them were nice.

But this man seemed to be the worst part of my life right now, and I should be happy. Everything is going well. My bedroom is finally finished, I've not had another strange dream like the one I had the first night at the new house, and the cold feeling I get around Jason seems to be going away.

I hadn't spoke to Lilly since my first date with Avery, other than through email. I'd yet to speak with Oliver, which I found quite strange, considering I'd been closer to him over the past few years than I had been with Lilly.

"'Annah! Please, darling, come back to earth for just a second." Were the nicest words I had heard Nigel say all afternoon.

I was just about to scream,

"Nigel, my name is **H**annah! not Anna! Would you like it if I ran around calling you Igel?"

But I decided not to. That would not be a good way to restart my career.

I sat up straight and said,

"Are we done yet? These boxes are giving me splinters in places I have never had splinters before! And I _don't_ like it."

Mr. Flemming sighed and let his camera dangle from the strap attached to his neck. He crossed his arms across his chest and stared at me.

"If you hadn't made me wear clothes that look like they've been shrunk fifty times in the wash, I would not have to deal with splinters, and you would not have to deal with my complaints!" I complained once again.

He sighed again and excused me from the set with a flick of his wrist. I gladly ran into the small dressing room they had set up for me, snatching a robe from the outstretched hand of a woman standing outside the door.

Once inside, I flipped open my phone with one hand, and pulled up the navy blue tube top I was wearing with my free hand.

I dialed the number of Lee Potter, my temporary manager, and slipped the robe on while it rang.

Halfway through the fourth ring, He answered.

"Yes, Miley?" He asked, distractedly.

Lee had been one of my dad's friends back when he still performed, and knew all about me being Hannah.

"Hey Lee, what's up?" I greeted.

"Oh nothing much, just a ton of paperwork." He answered.

"Oh, well I don't want to slow you down, it's just, I'm gonna need two passes for the show in L.A. next week, I'm inviting some friends."

"Anything else?"

"Well, I'd like to pick them up in person before the show...so if you could arrange that for me..."

"No problemo." He answered, after what sounded like a bubble popping.

"Well, I'll leave you to your gum chewing." I said

"Thank you. Bye!" He said, before hanging up.

I set the phone down and pulled off the itchy blue tube top, replacing it with one of Jackson's old hoodies.

A knock on the door interrupted me from changing the rest of the way. I opened the door and saw the face of a dark haired girl wearing a short red sun dress.

She squealed, shreiked,

"Hannah!" and tried to give me an air kiss.

Just to be polite, I smiled and let her. She looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't quite think of where I knew her from.

"It's been _sooo_ long, _where _have you been?"

"Oh, I just, umm, took a break...I was a little stressed out, ya know?

"Oh, _I_ know. I _totally _know." She said.

"Why, just last week, I had to plan my father's 52th birthday party, help my mother buy a gift for her personal trainer, _and _take Madonna shopping! That cat refuses to buy anything without trying it on first, even _socks!"_

At the mention of her cat, I suddenly knew who this was. She must've had surgery, because her nasaly voice was no more.

"Oh, Traci, you are such a busy bee! You should do what I did! Take a break, and only come back when the world assumes you're dead."

She faked a laugh, and I said,

"How'd you know I was here?" I asked.

She laughed for real, and replied,

"Nigel tells me everything! He was once married to my dad's cousin Florence...and my Aunt Charlotte...and my mother..."

I gave her a strange look and said,

"You can't tell anybody else that I've been here, ok? Next week I'm gonna be on "Hey Hey L.A!" and I'm the surprise guest...and if you tell people, it won't be a surprise, right?"

"Yes, I suppose...now what am I gonna gossip about during book club?" She asked.

"Ummm...Oh, just the other day I heard that Hilary Duff was seen at Wal-mart looking for some dandruff shampoo!"

"Seriously? She shops at _Walmart?_ The root of all evil?"

"I thought you said overalls were the root of all evil." I replied

"That was before I learned that the dead guy that owns Walmart has more money than my dad!"

"A dead guy?"

"Yes! A dead guy! Imagine that...Well! It was nice seeing you! I better get going, just thought I'd stop by!" Traci said, before turning on her heel and heading for the door.

I pulled off the black and white plaid mini skirt I had on and changed into some jeans before doing exactly as Traci had.

When I pulled into our driveway, a familiar sports car was parked up by the house. I excitedly ran from the car to the house, and, after kicking off my shoes on the front porch, ran into the living room, screamed,

"JACKSON!" and jumped into his arms like a little baby.

"Hey, Miles, how are you?" He asked, after letting go and giving me a hug.

"Oh, I'm fine. Great, actually, except for Nigel Flemming, that man is such a weed-whackin', bucktoothed, hairless, pig wrestlin'-"

"_Who_ is Nigel Flemming?" Jackson interrupted.

"Oh, he's just a photographer...but enough about me, how's school?"

"Well...it's _school_...I have a pretty cool roommate though - he loves you by the way."

I smiled and said,

"Well than you'll just have to bring him an autograph won't you?"

"You have no idea how happy that would make him. It just about killed him when you disappeared. He cries about it in his sleep almost every night...kinda reminds me of Oliver."

I gave him a strange look and wiped a strand of hair out of my eyes.

"Well, before he knew you were you, of course." He quickly corrected.

"Miley? Is that you?" My dad called from upstairs.

"Yeah!" I called back.

"Oh, good, your dinner's on the stove, it should still be warm!" He yelled.

I went into the kicthen, which was the only room on the first floor that wasn't being remodeled at the moment, and grabbed a plate from one of the boxes on the floor. I scooped some potatoes onto it, took a biscuit, and stabbed a piece of steak with a fork before using my finger to push it off and onto my plate.

Next I opened the now functional refrigerator, grabbed a Coke, and spotted a note on the door as I shut it.

"Oh, dad just typed those up for whats-his-name, he wanted me to show them to you." Jackson explained.

I pulled it off the fridge and went into the living room to eat.

As I ate my dinner, I read the note. At the top in bold letters, it said,

**Boyfriend Rules**

Under that, it said,

1.Use your hands on my daughter and you'll lose them.  
2.You make her cry, I make you cry.  
3.Safe sex is a myth. Anything you try will be hazardous to your health.  
4.Bring her home late, there's no next date.  
5.Only delivery men honk. Dates ring the doorbell. Once.  
6.No complaining while you're waiting for her. If you're bored, change my oil.  
7.If your pants hang off your hips, I'll gladly secure them with my staple gun.  
8.Dates must be in crowded public place. You want romance? Read a book.

"Oh my god." I said, swallowing a piece of steak.

"He stole these from that one show...with the guy that died...what was it called?"

"I don't know, but they seem like pretty good rules to me." Jackson said, sititng down nect to me on the couch.

I tossed the paper at him and laughed.

"I can't believe him."

Jackson set the "Boyfriend Rules" on the coffee table, and leaned back on the familiar couch.

It seemed so normal to see him here, on this couch. It was almost as if he had never left for school.

"So how long are you here?" I asked.

"Just the weekend." He replied.

"Then I have to go back to work, and then school starts again in a couple weeks." He sighed, and I said,

"Well...the remotes under your butt, I'm gonna take a shower."

"And I need to know that_, why_?" He asked.

I was glad to see the old Jackson back.

"I don't know, maybe your roomate wants you to record everything I do and report back to him on monday with a list of exactly how long my showers are, down to the millisecond, and how many times I chew before swallowing."

"He doesn't strike me as the crazy stalker type."

I laughed and went upstairs to take a shower.

After turning on the water, I went back into the hallway to grab a new towel. When I came back, the bathroom seemed colder.

I turned the faucet so the water would get a little warmer, and took off the hoodie I was wearing.

I climbed into the shower safely, and got my hair wet. I turned around to get the shampoo from the shower caddy, and the water hit my stomach. It started stinging really bad, so I looked down.

There was blood flowing down the drain, and my stomach looked so gross I wanted to pass out.

I took a deep breath and stepped back, out of the water's path.

Carved into my stomach, just deep enough to make it bleed, was the word

LEAVE


	5. Chapter 5

**_if you guys ever have a moment where you thing "I'm going to watch 'Beneath Still Waters'" please don't. Do not torture yourself like that. You'd be better off running through a feild of thorns barefoot, hopping into a lion's cage at the zoo, setting yourself on fire, and putting a bullet through your brain. I know there will probably be somebody out there who is gonna wanna rent it now...but seriously, don't!!! go watch hairspray instead. great movie. much more...inspirational...n no stupid ppl asking a guy they just ran over with their car if he's ok_**

**_Here's my disclaimer - _**

**_There, it's all in invisible._**

I didn't even realize I was breathing until I started feeling lightheaded.

I must've done it in my sleep.

Yeah, that's it. They said those pills might have side effects. I'll just clip my fingernails before I go to bed, and I'll be fine.

I reluctantly looked down again, and sighed, before painfully finishing my shower.

Convinced that I would ingore the pain, I got out of the shower, got dressed, and went back downstairs.

"Hey Jackson, do you know where the fingernail clippers are?" I asked, knowing perfectly well that he wouldn't.

"_No!"_ He announced, annoyed that I was interrupting his television viewing.

I went into the kitchen and started digging through the box of stuff that goes in the junk drawer. I found them and opened the refrigerator, taking the half empty bottle of Coke Avery had bought me the day before out and headed into the living room to cut off my fingernails.

I took a big drink of the flat soda, and clipped the thumb nail on my left hand before tossing it into the garbage can next to me.

Once I was finished, I sat down on the couch next to Jackson and started watching what he was watching, which so happened to be Spongebob.

"I can't believe they still show this." I complained, not having enough energy to convince him to change the channel.

I must've fell asleep on the couch, because, next thing I knew, Jackson was waking me up.

"Hey! I get the couch! Go use your own bed!" He yelled in my face.

"Whatever." I mumbled, trying to get up, but I dozed off again, falling back onto the couch.

I woke up instantly when all the blood in my body rushed to my head, since Jackson had me over his shoulder.

"Put me down." I mumbled not awake enough to tell him loud enough so he could hear it.

He set me down once he got to the top of the stairs, and shoved me towards my room, before heading back downstairs.

I slowly made my way to my room, and fell on the bed, falling asleep without bothering to change my clothes.

The second I fell asleep, I realized I had forgot to take my pills, since I started having another nightmare. I stared at the ceiling and decided to skip them for one night. I closed my eyes again and was sent into dreamland.

_It was almost as if somebody had shoved me through a doorway into my nightmare, because it started with me being shoved against a truck. I couldn't see the shov-ee's face, but I knew perfectly well who it was. He had his mouth on mine, and I was trying desperately to push him away, but he was too strong. Before I could figure out what exactly was going on, he had me in the back of his truck. It was such a vivid dream I could almost feel him on top of me. The "mystery man" grabbed my leg and held it between his without his mouth leaving mine. Our lips parted for a second as he ripped the front of my shirt open so hard every button fell off. I took that opprotunity to scream for help, but unlike real life, no sound came out. But obviously he heard, because he soon smacked my head against the bed of his truck. He continued what he was doing, only worse, and more sickening, even though I was unconcious. I prayed to god I would wake up from this nightmare before I actually had to see his face, but I was unlucky. As he sat up, finished, the shadow that had been hiding his face disappeared. But it wasn't my step brother's face that I saw. It was Avery's._

I woke up in a cold sweat and sat up so quickly I got nauseous. When everything stopped spinning, I turned to my alarm clock.

1:34pm

I couldn't believe I had slept that long. I hadn't slept in this late since New Years Eve when I was thirteen.

I continued to lay in bed, still shocked because of the outcome of my nightmare. I finally decided to get out of bed at 2, when I heard my phone ring across the room.

I reluctantly answered when I saw Avery's number on the screen.

"Hello?"

"Hey." he said, obviously not as freaked out as I was.

"What's up?"

"Nothing...I, I just, uh, I just got up." I managed to say.

"It's like, two."

"Yeah, I know, I was really tired."

"Are you too tired to hang out today?" He asked.

"Ummm...well...I can't...I'm going back to California for a couple days...I thought I told you."

"Oh...yeah, I guess I forgot...Just make time for me when you get back, ok?" He said, sounding very disappointed.

"Ok...I'm sorry." I appologized.

"Oh it's ok...well goodbye...I love you."

"Love you too." I said, before snapping the phone shut.

"Miley!" My dad's voice echoed up the stairs, the second I hung up.

I didn't bother to answer, and instead, went downstairs.

"Hey, you almost ready?" He asked me.

"Yeah...I just have to get dressed." I answered.

"Great. We're definately gonna be late now."

"I got all my stuff ready yesterday dad, don't worry."

He sighed a huge sigh of relief, and handed me a bagel.

"What have you been doing up there all day?" he asked.

"Sleeping." I answered.

"Really? Good for you." He said, smiling.

"It's just sleeping dad." I said putting the bagel on a plate and sitting down at the card table set up in our kitchen.

"Yeah, but you didn't take your pills, and nightmares didn't keep you awake all night."

"How do you now I didn't take them?" I asked, confused.

"You told me yesterday that you were out." He said, feeling my forehead.

"Dad, that's not gonna do anything, and I'm fine, really."

"Are you sure?" He asked.

"Yeah, just peachy." I replied, nowhere near breaking into a smile.

"You gonna eat?" He asked me.

"I'm not really hungry." I told him.

He gave me one of those glares, so I took a bite.

"Yummy." I said, rubbing my stomach, having forgotten all about the huge woud covering it.

I winced in pain, and my dad's eyes got huge.

"What?" I asked.

He pointed at my stomach, so I looked down. Blood was starting to soak through my shirt. Dad lifted it up and looked at the newly bloody word carved into me.

"What did you do?" He asked, loudly.

"Nothing...I must've done it in my sleep, they said those pills could make me act weird, didn't they."

"I don't know...maybe I should send you back to a therapist."

"No! Dad, have you never noticed what's wrong with that word?"

"What's wrong with it?" He asked me, calming down a little.

"In case you didn't notice, it spells The Rapist. Not exactly what I need right now!"

"If something like this happens again, you have no choice." he warned me, with the legendary pointer finger in my face.

The rest of the day went by so fast I couldn't even remember it.

All I know is i had to sit on a plane for too long and listen to a grumpy stewardess complain about me.

_I bet if you knew who I was you wouldn't be telling that lady that I'm an annoying little brat. _I thought to myself.

By the time we got to California, I desperately wanted to push the lady out the window.

But the plane landed, and nobody was hurt.

Just our luck, the limo company didn't have our limo ready, so we had to wait almost two hours before they had one for us to use. I guess I wasn't as important since he had no clue who I was.

The limo driver finally got us to our hotel and just as I suspected, our room had an electricity problem, so they had to get us a new one. We finally got to our room, and while dad put the key in, I looked around. Down the hall, I swear to god I saw Amanda Bynes kicking the ice machine. But I ignored it. Besides, almost everybody has got mad at an inanimate object at one point in their lifetime. I looked the other way, and saw nothing.

The hallway had a light gray wallpaper on the top half of the wall, and a rust colored wallpaper on the bottom. There was some dark grey trim separating the two. There were some knock-offs of greek statues of naked men, covered only with a seashell, at each end of the hallway, and a bench surrounded in plants down by the elevator.

While I was observing, I thought I saw some kind of animal down the hall, but it stood up on two feet and ran away the second I saw it. It must've been a little kid.

Finally, dad got the key to work and we went inside. Not even bothering to look around, I opened my suitcase, put on my pajamas, and climbed into bed. I was exhausted from traveling, and it was late.

"You want some sleeping pills?" My dad asked, right after I closed my eyes.

"They aren't as strong as yours, but I brought them just in case." I tiredly swallowed them without water and rolled over.

Fortunately, the pills worked, and I was able to sleep without any nightmares. Since they weren't as strong, I wasn't able to sleep as long though, but that was a good thing, because I was able to use the extra two hours to get ready for the show today. By 8:20, I had donned the familiar blonde wig, twisted it up and fastened it with a clip, so I wouldn't be sweating throughout the entire thing, and gotten dressed. All dad had to do was get dressed and stick on his mustache, so we were soon on our way to pick up Lilly, who had no clue she was about to see Hannah Montana before everybody else.

On the way to Lilly's house, in the limo, I pulled up my shirt to make sure I wasn't bleeding again, and luckily, I wasn't. I felt very relieved and jut sat in the back seat for the rest of the way there, staring out the window.

We stopped at a stop sign, and a man sitting on a bus bench, covering his face with a newspaper, looked up at me.

I tried to stay calm, and managed to swallow the scream that was making its way up my throat. I rubbed my eyes, and the face changed from that of my step brother, to the face of a man I had never seen before.

I took a deep breath, and concentrated on the back of my dad's seat for the rest of the way thre, whilst trying to convince myself I wasn't crazy.

**_sorry this sucked...but I had like two minutes to finish it...FYI I won't be updating for like, a week, cuz I'm grounded...which totally sucks, cuz now all I can do is read this really boring book all week...parents are so unfair_**


	6. Chapter 6

**_I'm so sorry lol, this took longer than I expected...my great Uncle sent me the 5th, 6th, and 7th Harry Potter Books, and for the past six days that's what I've been doing...but now that I'm finished, I have no clue what to do with my bookmark...but anyways...i deleted like half of my stories, blah blah blah...its soooooooooooo humid outside right now, I almost have to take a shower each time I go outside cuz I sweat so much. disgusting..._**

As we turned onto the road Lilly's house was on, the limo slowed down. We stopped three or four houses away from hers, and the driver, who was dressed in normal clothes rather than the tuxedo jacket and dress pants my old driver always wore, got out and headed down the street. I watched him out the tinted windows as he knocked on the front door.

The door swung open, and I could see a blonde head poke through the doorway. I couldn't be sure it was Lilly, and not her mother, since we were so far away, but when an easily reccognized brunette head followed her, I was positive.

The driver, Cory, said something, and Lilly turned to look at Oliver. He shrugged his shoulders, and they both followed Cory down to the end of Lilly's driveway. They stopped in front of a silver Pontiac parked in front of the neighbor's driveway, and Cory said something else, while signaling to me with the hand he had held behind his back.

I opened the door facing the sidewalk and extended a foot out the door. My dad turned around and smiled, and I put out the other one.

I pulled myself out of the car and stood up, closing the door behind me.

Cory was still talking to Lilly, who looked extremely annoyed, when Oliver quickly glanced my direction. I could see his jaw drop, and he pulled on Lilly's sleeve. She pushed his arm off of her and he tugged again. She turned to tell him to stop and saw me. She screeched so loud I had to cover my ears, and sprinted my direction.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!! I can't believe you're here!!" She yelled, flinging herself into my arms. I hugged her, and laughed, and Oliver slid to a stop behind Lilly.

"What are you doing here?" He asked.

"I'm reviving my career." I said matter-of-factly.

"Really? Cool!" Lilly said, but then her smile shrunk and she looked as If she were trying to flip her eyes around so they could see inside her head.

"Then...why are you here?" She asked, once she learned they wouldn't move that far.

"Because we're going with her, stupid!" Oliver said, smiling. He looked at me to ask if he was right, so I nodded.

"Yay yay yay!!" Lilly screeched, jumping up and down. Once she gave up on Oliver joining her, she stopped, and said,

"Well, what are we waiting for?"

"I have you're disguises in the limo." I said, as Lilly climbed in.

Oliver made his way to the door, but before he could get in, I grabbed his arm. He turned to look at me, and I pulled him close to me.

Once we were done hugging, I said,

"You got a haircut."

"Yeah, Lilly kept threatening to sneak into my house and cut it off while I was sleeping, so I figured it was time."

I laughed and let go of him, following him into the back seat.

While everybody got changed, I pulled out a sheet of paper with the lyrics to the song I was singing.

I nervously reread the part of the song I was singing at least thirty times before the Limo stopped.

When I looked up to open the door, I swear I saw a familiar little animal hiding behind a car on the other side of the parking lot. But, it stood up on two legs, took three steps, and vanished into thin air before I could tell what it was.

"Miley?...Are you gonna open the door?" Lilly whispered behind me.

"Oh..." I opened the door and ran into the building before you could say mushroom. Although I'm not sure why you would want to.

Within ten minutes, I was all alone in the dressing room they had set up for me, sitting on the floor, humming "You and Me Together", not quite sure of exactly what I was doing. I pulled out one of the four inch long earrings hanging from my ear lobes and untwisted it.

I was interrupted by a knock at the door.

Thinking it was Lilly or Oliver, I didn't answer.

"Hannah?" Came a very strong English accent from the other side.

I got up clumsily, tripped and smacked my forehead into a mirror, causing the corner to break off, in my journey to the door.

My hand flew to my forehead and I sqeaked "Ow.", before opening the door.

"What happened?" Lizzie Halliwell, famous popstar, with her long, dark red hair and her green eyes, and her makeup that made her look like a cat, asked when she saw me.

"Tripped..." I muttered.

She laughed and said,

"I'm Lizzie." She held out her hand, which I shook with the hand that wasn't stopping my brain from exploding, and she said,

"It's so great to meet you. I used to be a HUGE fan, I think it's great you're singing again."

I smiled and dropped my hand from my face, which throbbed in pain. There was blood on my hand, but it wasn't somethig that wouldn't stop bleeding in a minute or two.

"Oh, you're bleeding!" Lizzie exclaimed, rather stupidly.

"It's nothing." I said.

I stooped down to pick up the broken piece of mirror, and when I did, I saw the face of a young girl with brown eyes, dirty blonde hair, and a huge frown on her face. I shreiked and dropped the mirror, which broke into even more pieces.

"That's a lot of bad luck." Lizzie said, still thinking it was funny.

I felt a pain in my stomach, and turned my back to her. I lifted up my shirt but my stomach wasn't bleeding again, so I dropped it and smoothed out my hair.

I took out the clip that was holding half of it back, and smoothed it out before clipping it again.

Lizzie looked at the clock, and said,

"Well, I have to go...maybe we can have lunch after the show?" She smiled nervously and left.

I looked down at the broken mirror. I picked up the one that undoubtedly had cut my head open, since it had blood on it, and held it in my hand.

For a reason unbeknownst to me, I squeezed my hand shut around the mirror so hard the blood started trickling throught the cracks between my fingers. I didn't feel any pain, and just stared at it as if I was watching it through a window.

The door burst open and my dad came in, but I didn't notice. I _did_ notice, however, that he saw what I was doing and yanked the mirror out of my hand.

"Miles! Miley! Miles?" He yelled in my ear.

He had yelled my name thirteen times before I stopped staring at my hand and looked up at him.

"What are you doing?" He yelled again. I looked behind him and saw Lola and Mike standing in the doorway behind him, with frightened looks on their faces.

I shook my head and pushed past them, where I went to the bathroom to wash out the cut, which, now, was causing me pain.

It had finally stopped bleeding when the door opened and Lilly came in.

"What happened?" She asked.

"I saw somebody." I told her, "In the mirror."

She still looked confused, so I said,

"It wasn't me."

I started dabbing at the cut on my forehead with a wet paper towel, and she inhaled, about to say something.

"That mirror. I think it possessed me." I said, before she could get anything out.

"Possessed you?" She asked, obviously thinking I was crazy.

"Yes! It made me squeeze that broken mirror, and I _couldn't feel anything_...It didn't hurt."

"Do you need to go lay down or something, 'cause I'm sure they can cancel this."

"No!" I yelled, frightening her even more.

"Sorry..." I said, before pushing past her and leaving the bathroom, just as Lizzie started singing.

I smiled to myself, hearing her sing the song that I had written for her. She didn't know it, of course, but while I was in the therapists office, she always asked me to draw on this clip board while we were talking, and instead of drawing, I always wrote. The song she was singing was the last one I wrote.

I ignored her performance, and hurried to my dressing room, where I quickly covered the cut on my forehead with some concealer. I ran back out, and grabbed a microphone from a fat guy with a notebook held to his chest.

Lizzie finished the chorus, and I took a deep breath before singing.

"Little girl don't be so blue, I know what you're going through." Before walking out onto the stage.

"Don't let it beat you up." I looked out into the audience, where people were screaming. One loser even passed out.

"Hittin' walls and gettin' scars, only makes you who you are-"

"Only make you who you are." Lizzie sang.

I smiled and started singing louder.

"No matter how much your heart is aching, There is beauty in the breaking. Yeah."

Lizzie joined in, and we both started singing the chorus.

"When you're broken, In a Million little pieces, And your tryin', But you can't hold on any more, Every tear falls down for a reason, Don't you stop believin' in your self, When you're broken!"

Lizzie dropped the microphone to her side, and I sang,

"Better days, are gonna find you once again."

"Every piece will find it's place!" Lizzie sang again.

"When you're broken"

"When you're broken." She repeated.

"When you're broken, In a Million little pieces, And your tryin', But you can't hold on any more, Every tear falls down for a reason, Don't you stop believin' in your self, When you're broken! Oh when you're broken, when you're broken, when you're broken."

The music stopped and people started screaming my name.

"HANNAH! HANNAH! HANNAH! HANNAH!"

I smiled and waved to the audience. I blew them all a kiss and they screamed even more.

Suddenly, the screaming stopped, and Caroline Styles, most famous interviewer in this area, motioned for me to come sit by her.

I did, and she smiled at me.

I smiled back, secretly wondering how much longer I would have to hold my face in this position.

She shreiked and said,

"I did not expect that. Even I didn't know who our suprise guest was gonna be and I work here." She laughed, and I held my face in the smiling position for about two seconds.

"So, Hannah, where've you been for the past...four years, I think it's been."

"I just needed a break." I said. It was mostly true.

"So, do you have a new album coming out, or...what are your plans?"

"I've recorded my fifth album early this summer, and I think they said, it's coming out on...August nineteenth...some time in August."

My head started throbbing again and I resisted the urge to put my hand back on my forehead, although it felt like somebody already had. The pressure on my forehead was so painful I couldn't hear a thing Caroline was saying.

I felt like sombody had put a thousand pound weight on my forehead. My hand flew up to my forehead, despite my attempts to keep it away, and the pain got even worse.

And worse.

And worse.

I had no clue why it was hurting so much, I mean, after all, it was only a little cut.

The pain got so unbearable, I inhaled sharply, causing Caroline to stop talking and look at me.

I couldn't hear her, but I knew she was asking me if I was ok.

I inhaled again, and I couldn't see, or hear, anything.

I felt my eyes roll back in my head, and I slid off the chair.

"Next thing I knew, I was on the floor, out cold.

**_Aww...that sucks...oh well, hopefully it will be better next time, I have plans for that chapter...if I can remember them when I update lol._**


	7. Chapter 7

_"I'm gonna miss you." He says._

_I don't say anything. I just stare._

_He kisses me on the forehead and reaches for my hands, which he holds in his hands for at least five minutes._

_When he finally lets go, I go back into the house to find the lightest box I can._

_It's found in the kitchen, and is full of bread. But before I take it out to the truck, I get one last drink of water from the sink, and stare out the window above it._

_There's the neighbor I never see, crawling through his back yard in hopes he won't be seen trying to water his garden._

_He's lucky. He gets to stay in one place for his whole life. I don't._

_The front door slams, telling me that everybody else is working, and I'm not, so I pick up the box and head outside._

_I set the bread box on the back seat and turn around to go back into the house, when I feel hands on my shoulders._

_"Are you ok?" he asks._

_I nod and continue into the house, where I pick up a box full of DVDs. It's a lot heavier than the bread, but I can handle it._

_When I get to the door, I rest one end of the box on my hip, and try to open the door with my free hand, but it doesn't work, and I end up almost dropping the box._

_"You shouldn't be carrying that." My dad tells me, taking the box out of my hands._

_"It's too heavy."_

_"I can handle it." I tell him, but he gives me a look of refusal, and I go back into the house to find a lighter box._

_Once all the light boxes are loaded, I sit on the front steps and pulls my knees as far up to my chin as they can go._

_I stare at cracks in the sidewalk for almost an hour before Lilly shows up._

_She quietly sits down next to me, and says,_

_"I'm sorry...I'm really sorry...in fact if there was a word for how sorry I am, I would've said it a long time ago."_

_I just gently turn my head and look at her._

_"I've been a crappy friend." She says._

_"I...I should've believed you...I just...I don't know why I didn't, but I hope you'll forgive me."_

_She looks at me, hoping I'll say "Of course I forgive you, let's go down to the beach and throw stuff at Rico before I leave!" but I don't._

_"I...Miley, I've been crying about this for weeks...I should've apologized a long time ago...actually, I shouldn't even have to apologize...I just...I don't want you to leave without knowing how sorry I am...and how much I'll miss you."_

_She looks at me again, but I still don't say anything. Lilly sighs and starts to get up, but I grab her hand and pull her back down onto the steps._

_I pull her into a hug, and surprisingly, she's not the one crying the most._

_"You _**were**_ a crappy friend." I whisper, jokingly._

_She laughs and wipes her eyes, and the guys, and Linda, come through carrying out the last of the furniture._

_"I'll miss you." I whisper to Lilly._

_She smiles through her tears, and says, _

_"Me too...and Oliver. He's in Nebraska with his Aunt and Uncle, otherwise he'd be here too. He wanted me to tell you he's sorry, and that he's gonna miss you...and that you have to send him one of those I Love New York Tshirts." _

_"I'll get two. Then you'll match." I tell her, hugging her one last time._

_She steps back against the house with everybody else that isn't coming, except for one person, who is standing next to the sidewalk watching me._

_I look at him as I open the door, and start to climb in, but I pause for a second, and decide to turn around._

_He's turned his back on me and is walking towards the house, so I yell his name._

_"Jake!" I yell._

_He turns around and I, as carefully as I can, fling myself into his arms, where I press my lips against his for as long as I can without my dad clearing his throat loudly behind me._

_When I pull away though, it's not Jake's face that I see though, it's a face that makes me scream every time I see it, a face that scares me to death, the face that haunts my dreams, the face that put me in this state._

_It's Ben's face._

And I wake up screaming.

"Miley, Miley! Miley stop screaming!!" My dad yells in my face.

I stop screaming, but my breathing is just as loud.

Lilly and Oliver are hovering over me, and I'm on the bed in our hotel room.

I slowly sit up and look around. I take a deep breath and say,

"I'm ok now...can we go home?"

My dad looks from Lilly's face, to Oliver's face, to my face, and says,

"When we do, you are definately seeing a therapist."

"No!! Dad, please, no!" I yell in his face before getting off the bed so hastily I knock over the lamp on the side table next to me.

"I'm not going! I refuse to go!"

"Miley Stewart, you are going whether you like it or not. You need help!" Dad yells at me.

"What?" I ask, quietly, not expecting an answer.

My own father thinks I'm crazy.

"What about you?" I ask Lilly and Oliver. "Do _you _think I'm crazy?"

They look at each other before looking at me, giving me the answer without even saying anything. I start sobbing and head to the bathroom, where I lock the door behind me, and slide down to the floor.

"Miley, come out of there." My dad says from the other side of the door.

"No! I'm not going unarmed into a room full of people willing to put me in a straight jacket the second I step foot out the door." I yell back at him.

"Miles, come on, we don't think you're crazy. I just want you to talk to someone."

"Im not talking to anyone. I just stopped thinking about it every waking second, I'm not talking about it to some loser who thinks she's a doctor!"

Nobody says anything, so I just close my eyes and wait for my dad to say the limos here. When he finally does, I'm silent all the way out to the street, all the way to Lill's house, and all the way to the airport. I don't say a word until we get off the airplane back in Tennessee.

"Can I have some gum?" I ask.

Dad pulls a pack of gum out of the back pack he has over his shoulder, and gives me a piece.

I pop it in my mouth an stay silent for the rest of the night.

When I wake up in the morning, my dad isn't home, which takes away some of the awkwardness, but Linda is, and I'm sure he told her about it.

She's in the kitchen, putting picture frames and small decorative birdhouses on top of the cupboards, which were put in while we were gone.

"Hey sweety." She says, when I enter the kitchen.

I nod at her as if to say good morning, and open the fridge. I take the only water bottle left and lean against the counter to drink it.

"You need any help?" I ask her.

"Umm...could you...could you bring these down to the basement for me?" She asked, holding up three or four picture frames.

"Sure." I take the frames from her and go down to the basement. I set them on an old armoire and turn to go back upstairs, when something drips on my arm. I look up to see where it's coming from, and I see an old box. It's not ours, so I stand on a chair and pull it down. I set the box on the card table in the corner and take the lid off. It's full of pictures.

The picture on the top is one of the house. It's looks a lot better though. It looks as if it's just had a fresh coat of paint put on it, and the yard isn't overgrown. There's even a garden off to the side. On the front porch is a family. There's a bald man covered in dirt, wearing overalls and holding a shovel, and a stressed woman wearing an apron. There's two boy sitting on the floor in front of them, playing with some toys. One has his face in the shadows, but the other is looking straight at the camera with a sort of, evil grin on his face. He looks familiar, but I can't think of where I've seen him.

The second picture frightens me a little. The same people are in it, only they look a little older. The brother with his face in the shadows has his face covered again, and the woman is holding out an ornament for the christmas tree behind them. What scares me is what's next to the crhistmas tree.

On the wall, is a familiar mirror, with a familiar face reflected in it.


	8. Chapter 8

**_all right, you guys are lucky you're getting this, I was seriously considering giving up on all my stories...but, I decided that, for the two or three of you that still read this, I would finish this one the way was planning to, and just leave you in the dark about what happens next (that means no third one) and after that, I'll be gone for good..forever...I'm never coming back...not even to read your stories. thank you, for making me so unpopular..._again.**

_It can't be his face...its somebody that looks like him. He would've been older when this picture was taken. It's not him._

Try as I may, I can't convince myself for certain that the boy in the picture is not somebody I know. But I can try to forget about it.

The picture had me so mesmerized I never even noticed walking up the stairs, but once I did, I knew what to do.

I searched through the junk drawer and pulled out a lighter. We didn't have a fireplace so I used the sink. It took me three tries to get the flame to appear, and once it did, I held the lighter to the picture.

The flames quickly spread over the picture and flickered at my fingers. I tropped the tiny piece that I had been holding into the sink where it finished burning, and held my fingers up to my face.

The tips were extremely red, and in places, white, but I didn't notice any pain.

As I was staring at my fingertips, Linda came into the kitchen.

"What's wrong, honey?" She asked, obviously noticing the strange expression that had spread across my face.

I just looked up at her and left the kitchen, feeling her eyes bore holes in my back as I went up the stairs.

I just went into the bathroom, put the lid down on the toilet, and turned the sink on. I sat down on the toilet and dipped my fingers into the cold water that was filling the sink. I rested my head on my arm and closed my eyes, dropping into dreamland once again.

_The doorbell rang across the house, but I remained on the couch._

_It rang again, and I threw a shoe at the unlocked door, before it opened a crack and Jake came in._

_"Hey." He said clearly._

_"Hey." I mumbled._

_"How are you doing?" He asked._

_"Ehh..." I answered._

_He sighed and sat down on the floor next to me. I stared at him._

_"So...what are you doing next?"_

_I pulled a loose strand of my hair out of my face and avoided eye contact._

_"Moving." I mumbled._

_"What?" He asked, obviously not understanding me._

_"Moving." I said, a tiny bit clearer._

_"You're what?" He asked, this time surprised._

_"I'm moving Jake."_

_His jaw dropped and he put his arm behind him to support his body._

_"To New York...I have to."_

_"You don't have to." He whispered._

_"Yes I do. I have to put all this behind me...I have to...put you, behind me."_

_"What, why?"_

_"I'm sorry." I whispered, before turning on my stomach and burying my face in the pillow under my head._

_"Well...can I come see you?" He asked._

_I didn't answer, so he repeated the question._

_"Miley! Can I come see you?" He yelled._

_I turned my face just enough to uncover my mouth, and said,_

_"I'm sorry Jake...you'll just...remind me...it's bad enough that I have to live in the same state as the prison where my rapist will be sleeping...you don't need to make it worse..."_

_"But I...I..." He was silent for a minute, and said,_

_"I'll be thinking about you the whole time...just remember that."_

The dream normally would've ended there, but for some reason, it didn't.

_Jake stood up and grabbed my arm. He pulled me off the couch, and somehow, he had managed to get his right hand under my chin, and his left hand on the right side of my head._

_"I love you babe." He said, before snapping my neck._

I woke up suddenly, and noticed that the sink was overflowing. I quickly turned it off and yanked the the towels off the rack and started soaking up the water on the floor.

As I did, something popped into my head.

_It's bad enough that I have to live in the same state as the prison where my rapist will be sleeping...you don't need to make it worse..._

_You don't need to make it worse._

_You don't need to make it worse._

_You don't need to make it worse._

_You don't need to..._

_...make it worse._

I couldn't believe I had actually said that to him.

He loved me, and I told him he made me worse. It was so mean.

And I never got a chance to appologize.

I finished mopping up the water and went into my room to find my phone.

I dialed his number into my phone, purely out of memory,but not because I had ever called him. I always hung up after the second ring.

I hit the send button and held the phone to my ear.

"We're sorry, your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number, and dial again."

I punched the number into the phone again.

"We're sorry, your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number, and dial again."

I dialed again, and got the same answer.

I threw my phone across the room and screamed.

How stupid I had been to believe somebody as famous as him would have the same phone number three years later.

I sat on my bed, crying as loud as I could, out of guilt, for a good ten minutes, before the phone rang. I picked it up off the floor and looked at the name on the screen.

Avery

I put the phone down and laid down on my bed, staring at the ceiling.

Linda probably thought I was having another one of my eppisodes, so she remained downstairs. She used to try to comfort me every time, but I always ended up scratching her, or throwing something at her, or almost busting her eardrums from screaming in her ears, so she had learned to leave me alone.

Eventually I stopped crying, and went into the bathroom and splashed some water into my face. I looked up at my red, blotchy, face, in the mirror, and got an idea.

I had to put it all behind me.

I would feel so much better if I actually did what I told Jake I was moving to do.

I dug my laptop out of a box of random things I had yet to put away.

I set it up on my desk and flipped it open.

Ten minutes later, I went into the kitchen, where Linda, Daken, Jackson, and my Dad were putting away groceries.

I cleared my throat, but the ignored it, and kept putting away the bread and eggs.

I cleared my throat again, and Jackson looked up.

"Guys." He said, and they all looked up.

"Yes?" My dad asked, looked at me, who was being pointed at by Jackson.

"I'm going to New York." I said.

"What? Why? You hated New York." My dad asked.

"She hates it here too dad." Jackson said

"I'm not going because I like it...I'm going...to see...Ben."

**_Just to warn you, it'll probably be another week or two before I update, but don't give up, I promise I'll finish this one._**


	9. Chapter 9

**_still not convinced, guys, I don't even wanna write this right now...so..._**

They treat me like I can't handle myself.

Like I don't know how to do anything without killing myself.

"You can't control me!" I yell at them, before turning on my heel to leave the room. But before I could make it through the doorway, my dad grabbed my arm and pulled me into the living room.

"Miley, I know you want to go, but, I'm just worried..."

"What are you worried about dad? Are you worried I'll see him and kill myself?" I yelled at him.

"No...I'm just...I'm worried that when you see him...you'll go back to the way you were before...and I didn't like that...I don't think it's a good idea for you to go all the way out there alone."

"So If I took somebody with me..." I ask, breaking off at the end of the question.

"Well, I guess that would be ok." He said, with a look that told me he was regretting saying it.

"Like...who?"

"One of your friends...just not Avery...I know you like him, and I know he's a nice kid...I just don't want you alone with him..." He said, the look flickering across his face again as he saw my expression change.

"Why not dad? Don't you trust me? Do you really think that after I see the guy that raped me, I'm really gonna wanna have sex? It's not like I'm gonna get pregnant or anything!" I yelled at him, before storming up the stairs to my bedroom.

I fell down on my bed and covered myself in blankets, even though the room was hot. I wanted to get up and turn on the fan, but I didn't want to get up, so I suffered.

My dad came up eventually with some new sleeping pills he got, and set them on the nightstand, and the phone rang twice.

The third time it rang, I looked at the screen and saw Avery's number, so I decided to answer.

"Hello?" I whispered tiredly into the phone.

"Hey Miss Busy Body, you finally answered." He said.

"I've been tired...jet lag, ya know." I said, not even trying to hide the exhaustion in my voice.

"Oh, well if you want to get some sleep, I can call tomorrow..." He offered.

"Oh, no it's ok, say whatever you want, I'm listening."

He started talking but I paid no attention. I occasionally said "Uh huh", or "Yeah", or "I know" but I wasn't paying any attention.

Almost an hour later, he finally said goodbye, and hung up. I hit the talk button and dropped the phone next to my face.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep, but the second I fell asleep, I saw Ben's face, so I woke up, with an intense urge to scream.

I blinked and sat up, wiping my eyes. I took a deep breath and looked around the room, at the TV, my computer, the dresser, the door.

I decided to use the door. The TV and computer would only have Hannah news and I didn't feel like dealing with it. There was no reason to use my dresser, it was getting dark, and I had nowhere to go that I needed to get dressed for.

I stuck my head out the door and saw a blue light flickering across the wall down by the stairs, no doubt it was coming from the TV. I decided to go the other way, and I made sure I did it quietly, so as not to alert anybody downstairs.

Somehow, I found myself outside the bathroom, with my hand on the knob. I opened the door and stepped inside without turning on the light. I sat on the edge of the tub and looked down at what was in my hands.

For some reason, I had carried the sleeping pills into the bathroom with me. I wasn't sure if it was a sign, or just a coincidence.

God could be telling me to swallow all of them and overdose, but I seriously doubt god would want me to die. I'm willing to bet it was a coincidence.

I popped open the bottle and poured out two pills. It was a different brand, so I checked the label to make sure I wasn't supposed to take more, but it was the same as the other ones, so I popped the pills into my mouth and closed my eyes, before swallowing. They were bigger than the usual pills, so I had some difficulty swallowing them without water.

As my eyes adjusted to the darkness more, I looked in the mirror at myself.

I'm not exactly sure what I saw, but I sure as hell looked depressed.

Maybe dad's right, maybe I_ should _go see a therapist. I'm not willing to admit he's right out loud though, so I keep that thought to myself.

I yawn and rub the sleep out of my eyes before quietly making my way back to my room.

In the few minutes before falling asleep that I used to enjoy, years ago, My mind was going through a list of possible trip companions. I settled on calling Felicia Gorski, the Polish girl who lived down the street, and appeared to be as stupid as her name. I met her at the grocery store a week or two after we had moved here, and we had gone to see a movie together once or twice. I suppose you could call us friends, I mean, she was the closest thing to a friend I had around here.

I finally fell asleep and didn't wake up until 9:00 the next morning.

The first thing I did was get something to eat. Second, I called Felicia. She agreed to go with me, but she didn't know the circumstances. I told her I was going to see a friend in New York, and she said she'd go with me, that she'd never been there before.

As if I had any friends in New York.

After I hung up the phone, I went outside.

Along with the house, we had obtained 112 acres of land. Over half of it was farmland, but some of it was pasture. My dad said something about the previous owners having cows.

I walked along the fence that surrounded our property all the way to the back. There were a couple trees there, so I laid down in the shade and turned on my Ipod.

I got so lost in my thoughts that I didn't even hear the songs playing in my ears. I closed my eyes as hard as I could, trying to block out the light that still managed to show through my eyelids, but I was unsuccessful, so I quit trying.

Instead, I opened my eyes and stared at the clouds. I could feel my phone vibrating in my back pocket, but I left it there, I was feeling too lazy to take it out, and besides, I had a good feeling I knew who it was.

I rolled over on my stomach and buried my face in the grass.

I closed my eyes and fell asleep, without the help of sleep aids.

_It was a week before I'd be moving, and I hadn't told either of my friends. I stared at the phone, hoping that something would possess me, forcing me to pick it up and call Lilly, but nothing did, so I was left hoping._

_I was laying on the couch, with a blanket pulled up to my neck, and my feet sticking out the end. The floor above me creaked, and I pulled the blanket up over my head._

_I heard another creak, this time from behind me._

_"Hey. What's with all the boxes?" _

_It was Oliver's voice._

_I **knew **Oliver's voice. _

_Just the year before, I had had a huge crush on him. I heard his voice in my dreams every night._

_"Moving" I said, which turned out like "Muppels" instead, since I had the end of the plaid blanket in my mouth._

_"Huh?" He said. The thing about Oliver is, even if I had said it clearly, he would still have asked the same question._

_"Moving." I said clearly._

_"Oh." He replied._

_I was expecting a little more from him, but I had learned to expect disappointment._

_"Why?" He asked, after a full minute had passed._

_"To get away." I explained, not yet knowing how many times I would have to explain this._

_"I guess...that's...to be expected."_

_I could tell he'd been reading some old book, Oliver never talked like that, only after reading. When the sixth Harry Potter book came out, he read it all in one day and spoke with an English accent for the rest of the week._

_"Well...I wanted to, uh, appologize again." He said, still standing behind me._

_"You've appologized a thousand times, Oliver." I said._

_"I just, I feel really bad...that I...accused you...of...well, you know." He finally managed to say._

_"I forgive you." I told him, finally sitting up and turning to face him._

_He smiled and went aroud the couch to sit next to me._

_He said something, but I couldn't hear it. I must've come to the end of the dream, it was fading out like the end of a movie. But before It ended, I could hear one thing._

_Oliver grabbed me around the neck, positioned his hands on my head, and said,_

_"I love you, babe."_

_He twisted my neck so fast I could hear it snap._

And when I woke up, I could almost feel it.

The sound ran in my ears, giving me a headache.

Until I heard a snap that sounded way more real than any of the others, and it was coming from right behind me.

**_sorry its short, I have to go get something to eat before I starve to death, then you'll be left hanging hear, and you'd be even more disappointed than if I left you hanging at the end, like I'm planning...remember, REVIEW_ :D**


	10. Chapter 10

**_k, I appologize for taking so long, but theres nothing you can do about it...I'm sorry, but unless you can control minds..._**

_**did anyone watch that movie with the incredibly long name with emily osment in it? I did n i could not believe how stupid those characters were lol,(maybe you can contol **their **minds) I swear, the black hair dye really did something to her brain lol...but it was either that...or a lifetime movie about an amish murderer...**_

**_But yeah, this week was Homecoming! We won, of course. lol the dance was...interesting...I think a bunch of 90 year olds did the decorations...or the rolling stones lol, which is basically the same thing(I swear I thought they were 90 too lol)_**

"You're on my property." A voice rang out from behind me.

I turned around so quickly I could hear my neck pop. My hand shot straight to my neck as I asked,

"What?"

"You're on my property." Jason repeated.

"I am?" I asked, standing up and avoiding his gaze by looking into the trees behind him.

"Your property line is over there, by _those_ trees."

"Oh..I'm sorry...I'll...I'll go then." I replied, before turning my back on him to get away, almost like he was the Flu on the day before Prom. I didn't want to catch it, so I did my best to stay away from him.

"No, it's ok," He said. "I don't mind."

"Well, I have to go...uh...pack..." I said, trying to excuse myself.

"For your trip to New York?" His question sounded more like a statement, and his eyes confirmed the thought.

"Umm...I...how do you know about that?" I asked frantically.

He just smirked, before opening his mouth. I waited for him to tell me it was just a lucky guess, but he didn't.

"I know things." He said, the smile slowly sliding off his face.

"Like what?" I asked, stealing the smile and putting it on my own face, as I realized he was probably bluffing.

"Everything." He answered, finishing off with a click of the tongue, before swishing his arm past me in an effort to point to my left.

"You ever been back here?" He asked me.

"Umm...no...I just came back here 'cause...well...just because."

"You should come back here more often, it' pretty interesting."

"Interesting..._how?" _

"Well...just over there," He pointed to my right where a big stone...thing, for lack of a better word, was sitting on the ground, "Is a well from the 1830s."

"Really? I asked, "I thought it was just a pile of rocks."

"No...and the interesting part, in the 1850s, this family had a house right behind yours, and that was their well. They had two kids, a boy and a girl, and the kids were always playing around out here. Well, according to the library, this man showed up at the well when they were here, and they talked to him, and after a while, they were friends. They'd come out to the well every day to see him, but one day, the boy said something that made him mad, and the kids stopped coming. They started getting depressed, and the parents didn't know what was going on, so they had a doctor come see the kids, which, of course, didn't work, since doctors back then were so stupid."

He laughed and I tried to fake a smile, but I knew he could tell the difference. But he continued the story anyways.

"So since they couldn't be helped, their parents acted like nothing was wrong, and they kept sending their kids out to play when they them. One day, they went out to the well, and the girls just pushed the boy in. She dropped a bunch of rocks down the well to kill him, then she carved out her own eyes with a knife she stole from her dad."

He was clearly done with the story, and waiting for me to say something, so I whispered,

"Oh my god...his body isn't still in the well...is it?"

He smiled, and for a second, he looked...attractive , but then his smile disappeared and his hair fell in his face, so I couldn't be sure what I saw. For all I knew, he could have worms crawling out of his eyes and a rubber ball for a nose. With all that hair, I wasn't sure anyone knew what he looked like.

"See for yourself." He whispered back, mocking me.

I looked at the well, then back at Jason, then back at the well again.

"Go. I'll be right here." He said.

I took a step towards the well, wondering if it would be better to just run past it all the way home, but decided against it. I put my hands on the only side if the well that was actually above the ground, and took a deep breath. I peeked over the edge and screamed, but not because of what I saw. I wasn't even sure if I saw_ anything, _because all I know, is that something grabbed me from behind and tipped me over the side. I screamed, and stuck out my hands in an effort to grab the side, but I wasn't falling. Instead I was being pulled back up. I turned around and yelled,

"That was _not _funny!" But all the while I was laughing, which kind of defeats the purpose of yelling.

I slid down the side of the well and spread my legs apart, and started picking at the grass inbetween them, in an effort to slow down my heartbeat.

He sat down next to me, and I threw a dirt clod, that had come up with a weed I had just pulled, at him. He was smiling.

"Sorry." He said, laughing.

I stared at him for a minute, and for a reason I don't know, I reached out to him. He flinched, but I brushed his hair out of his face anyways.

"You looks kinda like Johnny Depp." I told him, which was was true.

"But I dress better." He said, laughing as he pushed my hand out of the way.

"Whatever." I smiled.

"Why are you with Avery?" He asked, out of the blue.

"Because...I like him." I said, not as unprepared for this question as I would've thought, but still unprepared.

"He's a jerk." Jason said, staring at the ground.

"As compared to you?" I asked.

"As compared to anybody."

"He is not." I argued.

"I can't stop you from doing what you want, but if I were you, I'd stay away from him."

"Good, 'cause if you got near him, I'd have to kick your ass for playing around with my boyfriend." I kidded.

He smiled but I could tell my arguement hadn't convinced him.

I stood up and said,

"Well, I have to go. See you later?"

"Yeah, sure." he said, absentmindedly.

As I walked into the trees, I turned around and asked,

"Jason...what do you know about me?"

He looked up from behind the well, and said,

"Oh I know _all_ about you. I know why you're going to New York. I know all your secrets. _All _of them."

**_Sorry this sucks...but I started this last thursday, and if I didn't finish it now, i never would, so I had to rush a little._**


	11. Chapter 11

**_Alright, I'll tell ya right now, I don't have much time so this is gonna be short n sucky...but that doesnt mean you can click the back button...cuz if u do...I'll find out...n I know a 450 lb guy that could easily sit on you._**

It took a few seconds for what he said to sink in, and when it did, I turned around, but he was nowhere to be seen.

_He's bluffing. _I told myself.

_No he's not. He knows!_

I don't have a clue what to do. If he knew...If he told anybody...

I stumbled through the trees, panicking. I started feeling lightheaded and put my hand out. Luckily it met with a tree. I dropped to the ground and put my face in my hands.

Tears started dripping through the cracks in my fingers.

_Pull yourself together_. I tried to tell myself.

I wiped the tears away and rubbed my mascara stained hands on my knees. I took a deep breath and pulled myself up.

I trudged through the rest of the trees back to the house. Nobody was there, but I called for my dad for at least ten minutes before believing it. They had a wedding today. I almost forgot.

But I needed somebody. Anybody.

I picked up the phone.

"Hello?" He must be at a party. There was music blasting in the background and he was yelling into the phone.

"Avery...can...c-can you...ummm...can you come over here...I need you." I whispered.

Somehow, he heard me.

"Yeah, sure, I'll be there in a couple minutes."

"Ok...thanks." I said, louder this time.

I hung up the phone and ran my fingers through my hair. It was greasy. I needed a shower.

I didn't move though. I sat down on the floor with my back to the refrigerator. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes.

Next thing I knew, he was sitting next to me.

"You ok?" He asked, taking my hand.

"No. He scared the shit out of me." I whispered.

"Who did?"

"Jason. The guy helping my dad renovate."

"Oh," His tone changed, "_him._"

I opened an eye and looked at him. He was mad.

"What'd he do?" He asked.

"Well...umm...he said some...stuff...I'd rather not talk about it...I was just...scared."

He wrapped an arm around me and pulled me into his lap. I rested my head on his chest, and he kissed the top of my head.

"I gotta go take a shower...but...can you wait?" I whispered into his chest.

"Sure." He said.

"The remote's on the couch, you can watch TV while you're waiting." I told him.

"Ok." He said. But he said it in that tone. The one that said, "Ok, I'll watch TV, but I'd rather be in the shower with you."

I looked at him closely, and noticed how much different he looked than the last time I had seen him.

His face was bony, and I could see his ribs through the blue and white striped polo he was wearing, he'd lost a lot of weight. There were lines etched into his face, they made him look stressed.

"What?" He asked. He'd obviously seen me staring at him.

"Nothing...you just...nevermind."

I went upstairs and climbed into the shower. I turned the water on as hot as I could bear. I stripped and climbed in. I just stood there for a minute, trying to erase what Jason has said from my memory. The water changed temperature slightly, so I grabbed the shampoo and started rubbing it into my hair. I rinsed the shampoo off my hands and wiped the soap out of my eyes. I turned around to turn the temperature up, and saw a red reflection in the shiny metal handle. I looked down at my hands and stopped breathing.

They were covered in something red. Something _blood _red. I rinsed it off and tried to tell myself I had imagined it, but when the blood started running down my face I screamed. I tried to wash it off, but blood just kept pouring out of my hair folicles. I lost my balance and fell down. I pushed myself against the wall, not caring that the water was spraying into my face. I screamed again, this time much louder. But this wasn't because of the blood.

The only thing I could see, out of the corner of my eye, was a figure outside the shower curtain. This person was shorter than Avery, and a couple inches thicker. Plus, the person's arms were sticking out at funny angles and their neck was crooked, causing their head to turn to the side. It got closer and I could see it was a girl. She had hair twice as long as mine flowing down her back. It started growing and the shadow of her hair consumbed the entire shower curtain.

Hair that would normally be so blonde that it looked white, but was so dirty that it was green, snaked around the edges of the shower curtain. It filled the entire tub and was starting to wrap around my neck before I could manage to scream.

I could hear the pounding of footsteps and the hair disappeared. I sank into the blood red water a couple inches, in relief, as the door opened.

"Miley?" Avery called into the bathroom. He jerked the shower curtain back and pulled me out off the water. He set me up against the wall and pulled my hair out of my face. I coughed up a bit of water, and he looked into my eyes, genuinely concerned.

"What was it?" He asked.

"The water, it was...I was...blood...hair...dead." Was all I could get out. He looked into the tub and said,

"What?" I pulled myself up using the edge of the tub and looked into the water. It was so clear you couldn't even tell I had taken a shower. The water was being sucked down the drain, making a loud sucking noise.

I took the towel Avery was handing me and wrapped it around myself.

"I'm crazy." I said as I fell into his arms.

"Youare_ not_ crazy." He said. "You're sick. Everytime I call, you're in bed, your dad says you haven't left the house in days. You hallucinate when you're sick, it's natural." He tried to convince me, and it was working.

"Ok...I'll just...go...get dress then."

He let go of me and I went to my room. I put on some sweatpants and a black T-shirt with the words "Archer's Army" across the front. I got the shirt from one of my cousins, aparently, Mr. Archer was one of her teacher's. They'd sold the T-shirts to raise money for him to get Chemotherapy. She told me she wanted me to have it, and it was the last time I saw her. She died in a car accident two weeks later.

I don't know why that memory came into my head, I wore the shirt all the time, and I hadn't even been that close to her.

I wiped a tear out of my eye and went downstairs. Avery was in the kitchen, with a bottle in his hand. He had a glass of Coke in the other.

"You want one?" He asked.

I knew the bottle was filled with Vodka, but I nodded anyways, I needed to forget for a while.

He poured some into a glass and filled it up the rest of the way with Coke. He handed it to me and put the bottle down on the counter.

"Just one." I told him.

Oh, but how wrong I was.

**_k, well, after that whole shower thing, I kinda don't wanna go take one, but I have to anyways...so if I don't come back...I died in the shower..._**


	12. Chapter 12

**_Alright, good news!!! I didn't die, lol, bad news, ummm, can't think of any right now, but that doesnt mean there ain't any!_**

It definately worked.

I forgot pretty much everything.

I only had three glasses.

But all I remember is pasing out with a glass in my hand and waking up in the hospital without one.

Yes, the hospital. The epicenter of my hatred.

"Alcohol poisoning? Alcohol poisoning? How could she have alcohol poisoning? She doesn't even drink!"

The wonderful first words I hear, right in my ear, at the highest volume a human could possibly manage, on the dawn of my hangover.

I was afraid to open my eyes. I knew that there was a big chance that if my dad knew I was awake, he would most likely have his hands around my neck before you could say potato.

My curiosity got the better of me, and I opened the eye farthest from the biggest light source, just a crack. But he noticed. Oh, he noticed.

"Miley!" My dad shouted.

I groaned, mostly because my head was about to explode.

"Miley Stewart, what have you done!" He shouted, at a volume about .00001 percent lower.

"Could you...can you please..." I couldn't manage to speak without my splitting headache growing larger, so I just groaned.

"I think she's asking you to keep it down..." Came a reluctant voice in the corner that I knew, all to well.

"Oh and how would you know that? Can you read minds?" He snapped.

"No...I just...I know..." He quit talking, I suspect because of the look my dad was giving him. Not that I could actually see it, just, my dad gives me those looks all the time, and they definately make you shut up.

"You know what? How she feels? You get drunk a lot? I bet you do. You better pray to god that intoxicating my daughter is all you did to her."

"I...I'll just...go..." Avery stuttered.

"Good idea"

Dad watched him leave and turned to me, so slowly I expected his head to keep turning round and round like the possessed people in the movies.

"Miley." He whispered.

"Yeah?" I answered, scared.

"Why?" He asked. And that was it.

"I'm sorry dad...I didn't mean to...I just, I only had a couple...but..."

"Ok." He said softly. "Let's go."

That was it. Let's go. Maybe he _is possessed._

I got up and got dressed after he left the room. I reluctantly opened the door and stuck my head out. I saw him standing at the nurses desk, talking to one of the nurses. He looked my way and potioned for me to follow him with a turn of his neck. I followed him out to the car and closed my eyes. He was silent the entire way home.

The car stopped and he got out, but I didn't. Within fifteen minutes, I was asleep.

The sound of fingers tapping on the window(only about 10 times louder) woke me up. I opened one eye and looked out the window into the early morning light.

I opened the door and said,

"Dammit Avery, did you have to knock so loud?"

"Sorry." He whispered.

"Why are you whispering?" I whispered back.

"I want to live a long and healthy life."

I laughed as quietly as I possibly could, and asked,

"What are you doing here than?"

"I need to talk to you...but...not here. Follow me."

I followed him down to the end of the driveway, hiding behind trees the entire way. We went about a quarter mile down the road before we crossed the road and went into the woods.

"Where are we going?" I asked.

He stopped and sat down, with his back against a tree.

"I got in some trouble." He told me, looking straight into my eyes.

I caught my breath and sat down across from him.

"What kind of trouble?"

"Umm...After I left the hopital...I kind of...I got in a fight...and the other guy...he's not looking too good."

"WHAT!" I yelled, stretching the possibility of my head _not _exploding to the max.

"I didn't mean to, I just...he said something, and it made me so mad...I just...I couldn't stop myself, I was on him in seconds, I, I beat his head on the sidewalk until he was passed out...I don't think he'll make it Miley...you've got to help me...please."

"I have to?" I asked, in a sarcastic tone.

"Please, Miley, I'm so sorry. I'm sorry about everything...even the things you don't remember...I didn't mean to do it, I would take it back in a second if I could."

"What the hell did he say-what do you mean things I don't remember?"

He looked incredibly guilty, but didn't say anything.

"Avery!"

He remained silent.

"Does this...does this have to do with last night...?" I asked.

He looked into my eyes and looked even more guilty, if that was possible.

I fell back onto my hands, and cursed under my breath.

"Oh my god. Wait a minute...we didn't...we couldn't have...I'd remember it...I wasn't _that _drunk."

"We did...I remember it...even if you don't...I'm so sorry." He lowered his voice further. "You were...well, I was pretty drunk...and you...my god you were trashed...but you were like, all over me...I just...I'M SO SORRY!!" He suddenly yelled, and burst into tears.

"Oh my god Avery, don't freak out, you didn't break me." I said, suddenly finding this situation funny.

"Why are you laughing?" He asked, wiping his eyes.

"Avery. You didn't kill me. I'm still here, I didn't die...well, I got pretty close that one time, but, that's beside the point-"

"What do you mean?" He interrupted.

I got on my knees and move over next to him. I leaned against his shoulder, and asked,

"Can you keep a secret?"

He nodded, but said nothing.

"Well...I'm leaving tomorrow...to go to New York."

"Why?"

"To see my step-brother...in prison."

"Why's he in prison?" Avery interrupted again.

"Because...well...you see...he's really messed up...and...three years ago, my dad married his mom...so he was living in my house...and...well...I went to this party...and he was kinda drunk, but he was sober enough to know what he was doing...and...well...I asked him for a ride home..."

Avery took a breath, indicating he knew what I was about to say.

"Well...He kinda...raped me..." I whispered.

"And he's still in prison for that? How old was he?" He asked.

"17, but...that wasn't the only time...he'd sneak into my room a lot...n this one time...My brother, Jackson, he walked in on us...and Ben, my step brother...he shot him...and me...but Jackson was in a coma for a couple months...I just...well..."

"Wow." Was all he said.

"That's...that's not all." I said.

"What?" He whispered, wrapping an arm around me.

"Daken? My brother? He's...he'snot...he's not my brother."

**_well, I'm freezin my ass off rite now so I'm gonna go put on a coat n stand next to the stove...ok?_**


	13. Chapter 13

**_OK, first thing...It took me forever, but I'm alive and healthy...second...ummm...I don't know..._**

**_In order to scroll down any further, you _have _to read my HP one-shot (Lying Awake Sleeping -dumb name, I know)_**

**_Well, you don't have to...but...well, yeah you have to lol_**

**_Disclaimer - hufidofhidlfhuiolq (troll language)_**

He was quiet.

I was quiet.

It was quiet.

We were the quiet.

The quiet was us.

"How do you..." He started to whisper, "How do you do it?"

"Do what?" I whispered back, not obligated to speak any louder than he was.

"Why'd you...keep him...?"

"I don't know...sometimes, when I look at him...I wish I hadn't...but...I would feel so horrible about giving him up...even if I didn't want him."

"Ok...that makes sense...I guess..."

"It's the reason he can't talk you know."

"What is?" Avery asked, like he hadn't been listening.

"My age. I was barely even fifteen. They said there would be problems, mostly because of my size. And there were. His vocal chords weren't fully developed...They said he would probably be able to at least cry, in a couple months...but...he didn't. He still won't.

He just sat there, leaning against the tree, and I decided to stay silent and not bother him.

After what seemed like forever, he said,

"You wanna go home?"

"Yeah. I guess." I told him.

The silence carried over to the ditch we were walking in, and he didn't say a word the hole way back.

He stopped in front of the neighbor's house, and the light from their barn hit him.

I had never seen Avery like this before. He looked fifteen years older than the last time I saw him. His clothes were wrinkled and covered in a combination of dirt, blood, and leaves. He had dark circles around his eyes, and the lines around his mouth that were usually barely visible were now standing out like a skinny white guy with a gun in the black neighborhood of downtown Chicago. His hair was messed up and matted with blood. His usually clean hands were bleeding, still.

"Oh my god." I whispered.

"What?" He asked.

"You look horrible."

"Thanks." He said, sarcastically.

"I didn't mean...never mind, I'll...I'll see you when I get back." I told him, before sprinting up the driveway.

I slowed down while I was still in the shadows, and decided that it would be best if I snuck into the house. I looked up at my bedroom window, and, luckily, the wind had gotten underneath and pushed it open again, if that _was _what kept happening.

I looked around for a way to get up there, and saw a metal trashcan laying on its side by the barn. It'd have to do. I picked it up, flipped it over and set it next to one of the columns holding the porch roof up.

I climbed on top of it and grabbed onto the roof. I tried to pull myself, but my fingers slipped. I almost fell to the ground, but I caught myself. I reached for the roof again, pulled myself a couple inches up, and wrapped my legs around the porch column.

I inched myself up the column, little by little, desperately wanting to pick out the splinters I now had in my leg. I swung one leg up and missed, so I pressed the other against the column, and swung my foot up again, This time I made it.

I pulled my other leg up and sat down on the roof. I took a deep breath and slowly stood up. I made my way over to my window and stuck my fingers under it. I looked up for a second and swallowed a scream.

I swear to god that I saw a face in that window. And it wasn't one I recognized. The hair though, the hair, I did recognize. I was long and blonde, with a greenish tint to it.

I pulled my fingers out from under the window and fell back. I stuck out an arm to support myself, and rubbed my eyes with the other. The face was gone, but now I was reluctant to open the window.

I did it anyways.

Once in the room, I looked around, still breathing hard. I pulled a strand of hair out of my face and tucked it safely behind my ear. Then I looked out the window. At first, I noticed nothing. But then...

"Jason?" I whispered to myself.

"This is the final straw. You _are _crazy." I told myself.

But then, he did something I never would've imagined, no matter how crazy I was.

He waved.

I turned my back to the window, opened the bottom drawer of my dresser, and pulled out a pair of shorts and a T shirt. I put them on, and looked at the door.

It was suddenly cold, and I shivered, standing in the doorway. I cracked my knuckles a couple times, and reached out for the doorknob. I paused out in the hall, where it was, strangely, a lot warmer, and looked behind me.

Nothing.

I was being paranoid. I was insane. Isn't paranoia one of the signs of insanity? In my case, it was.

I moved slowly down the quiet hallway, and stopped, my hand on the doorknob of Daken's room. The doorknob felt warm, Inviting.

_Open me. _It spoke to me.

_Come inside. _

I listened to the nonexistent voices and went inside.

He was staring right at me, his hands gripping the railing of his crib.

I stared at him.

He kept staring.

Then, he smiled. He reached out a hand, and I stepped into the room. I grabbed the hand he was reach for me with, and his fingers wiggled.

I pulled him out of the crib and held him to my chest. I sat down with my back against the wall, and just held him.

I heard a noise come out of his mouth, and sat him on my knees.

"What?" I asked him, although I doubt he knew what it meant.

"Mommy." He whispered.

I almost let go of him.

"Oh my god. You talked!" I whispered excitedly.

_He called me mommy. He knows who I am. Even though I hardly ever spend time with him, he knows who I am._

I couldn't say how happy this made me. I witnessed his first word, even though nobody believed he would ever be able to talk.

_At least you got to hear him talk, even if you won't see everything else_. A unwelcome voice in my head told me.

Before I could interpret what I had just thought, Daken talked again.

"What'd you say?" I asked him, feeling bad about not listening to him.

"Run." He said.

"Run mommy, run."

"What? I said a little too loudly.

"Run." He said again.

I couldn't decipher this either. I was cut off by a smell.

Smoke.

I took Daken out into the hallway, and screamed.

Both ends of the hallway were in flames.

"Miley?" Somebody called my name. My dad.

There was no way out.

Well, there was one.

The stairs.

I couldn't get to them, but there was the railing. I could jump it.

"Dad!" I yelled, coughing from all the smoke.

I ran to the railing and leaned over. He was standing about four steps up, reaching towards me.

"Give him to me!" He yelled, also coughing.

I let Daken hang over the edge, and let go. He landed in my dads arms, and was rushed out of the house.

Great. They leave me in a burning house. How nice.

The fire was coming closer.

No fire alarms though. Strange.

It was cold again, even with the fire engulfing the entire second floor of the house.I was backed against the wall now, thinking about how painful this was about to get.

There was no choice. It was either jump, or die.

I bit my lip and ran, my head down, towards the railing. I leaped over it and hit the stairs, I started rolling down, each step like a safety pin in the balloon that was my consciousness

I hit the ground, on my back. My head hit the ground, hard, and the next thing I knew, I was out cold.

"Miley?" Linda whispered into my ear. I could feel the sunlight on my face, and knew we were still outside.

I sat up, instantly, with one thought in my mind.

_I have to get out of here._

_**Ok, it's a bit short, but it's the best I can do right now...kinda boring too...I'm sorry...well, you better hit that review button, or you'll wake up in the morning with **your_ **_house on fire._**

**_Just kidding...for anyone who took me seriously...I'm sorry you took me seriously..._**


	14. Chapter 14

**_Ok I'm sorry this is taking me so long, I promise I'll try n finish this up over Christmas break, which starts day after tomorrow - yay!!- but with my birthday monday and christmas tuesday, It might be a couple days..._**

**_Disclaimer: Ok, so I came up with this great idea for a TV show, and I was just about to send it in, when a ton of Santa's elfs burst into my house and stole it. Apparently the Disney people wished for it for christmas...too bad._**

Every noise that had been buzzing in my ears was silenced as I got up off the ground and shoved my dad out of the way as I made my way to my car. I took my keys out of the ashtray and started the car, before backing down the driveway at at least 40 m.p.h, ignoring my dad's yelling.

I sped off down the road, pulling into the Gorski's driveway and honking at least six times, before Felicia came running out. She tossed a backpack into the back seat and sat down next to me.

"I thought we weren't leaving until ten." She said.

"Well...I changed my mind."

She nodded and looked out the window as I sped down the road.

"You're phone's ringing." She announced as we left town.

"I know." I said, ignoring it.

A couple more minutes passed.

"Any particular reason you're going twenty miles over the speed limit?" She asked

"Yeah." I said, staring down the road with such intensity that you would think I was trying to see through it.

"And it would be?"

"It's kinda a long story." I said, trying to think of a good excuse no to tell her.

"We have a long ways to go."

Before I could stop myself, I was telling somebody I barely knew my entire life story.

"Wow...you're life would make a _really _good movie." She said.

"Thanks, that makes me feel great."

"Hey it made the last three hours go by pretty fast." She offered.

"True."

She was silent for a minute, looking out the window.

"You wouldn't happen to have one of your CDs in here, would you?" She asked, suddenly.

"Oh I have the new one in the glove compartment." I said, pointing.

"The one that doesn't come out until next week?" She asked.

"Awesome!!"

Felicia put the CD in and leaned back in her seat.

After about three songs, she turned the volume down and said,

"The only CD I have that's better than this, is the soundtrack to Alvin and the Chipmunks, (really cute movie, go see it if you haven't!! lol) and that's the guy off the mac commercials and Jesse McCartney singing in squeeky voices."

I laughed and said,

"He asked me out once."

"A chipmunk?"

"No. Jesse McCartney."

"Oh...what's he like?" She asked, turning the volume back up.

"I wouldn't know...we never actually got around to that date...busy, you know."

"Too bad...I had a huge crush on him in the 6th grade."

"Me too." I said laughing.

"Too bad he had to play the fat chipmunk..." She said.

"Yeah it's Alvin or nothing." I said in a mock Jesse McCartney voice.

"Oh my god...that was so weird."

"You wanna see something weirder?"

"Like what...?" She asked, reluctant to find out.

"Reach under your seat."

Felicia pulled a small plastic container out and sat it on her lap. She looked at me, then opened it.

"Oh my god! It's your hair!" She shouted, pulling the wig out and looking at it.

"Yeah give it here, I'm gonna need it."

"Why?" She asked, as I pulled over to the side of the road.

"I'm not going to New York in my pajamas." I explained, while pulling my now fake hair up into a ponytail, which was harder than it sounds, and adjusting my sunglasses in the mirror.

"Why do you..." She started to ask.

"Felicia, I can't go into a store and use Hannah Montana's credit card when I don't look like her."

"Oh..."

I pulled back onto the road and went a couple miles before pulling into the parking lot of a Kohl's right off the highway.

"Come on you're helping me." I said, pulling her out of the car and skipping through the parking lot, freezing, wearing only a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, that didn't even match.

"What do you think they're thinking about you right now? Felicia asked as we passed a couple staring cashiers.

"Probably that I'm the next Britney Spears."

She laughed and I said,

"She invited me to Christmas dinner once."

"Oh my god really? Did you go?"

"What do you think?" I asked, pulling a couple shirts off a rack near the dressing room and looping them over my arm.

"I didn't want to get beat with an umbrella, so I decided to stay home."

She laughed and held up a shirt. I took it and moved on to the pants.

Once I had about two weeks worth of clothes, I tried them all on and we headed to the check out.

"Where is everybody?" Felicia asked, as we came up to the empty checkout area.

I looked around and found the answer. Every female employee was surrounding a guy standing by the jewelry counter. I couldn't tell who it was, but apparently he was important.

"Do you think they'd notice if we just left without paying?" Felicia asked.

"The alarms would go off stupid, this isn't the 50s. The honor system went down the drain 30 years ago."

"Well, you're famous, bring it back. Just leave some money on the counter and let's go!"

Suddenly, a male employee took one of his co-worker's places, and motioned for us to come over. I set everything on the counter and he started ringing it all up. I pulled my sunglasses up so I could see inside my purse to find my credit card.

I suddenly became aware that the cashier was staring at me.

"Yes?"

He timidly went back to ringing up my clothes and I handed him my credit card.

He swiped it and asked,

"D-Do you think you c-could sign this for me?" He held out a napkin, and I oblidged.

"Oh my god." Felicia said, tapping my shoulder.

"What?" I asked her.

"Miley! It's...It's-" She whispered, but I was able to find out exaclty who "It" was without her telling me.

The guy from the Jewelry counter had broken away from his obsessed lady-fans and had made it over to the only open register. It turned out the guy from the jewelry counter was somebody I knew.

"Hey." The guy said.

"The guy" was Jake Ryan.

**_Sorry it's short, but I don't really have a clue what to do in this chapter, or the next...but after that, I have an idea!!_**

**_Also, I apollogize for the sucky-ness of this chapter..._**

**_REVIEW!!!!!!!_**


	15. Chapter 15

_**ok, so it wasn't a couple months or anything...I thought it would be...just, I all of a sudden feel like writing...I was inspired, in part, by my cousin[15!! almost dying...her BAC was 3x the legal limit...and she was all hypothermic...but for some strange reason, that made me want to finish this...that and **getting my permit!!!!!!!...**so here goes...**_

"What? But...you...how...HUH?" I stammered, unable to piece together a whole sentence.

"Miley?" He whispered, looking into my eyes.

"Jake...I...what are you doing here?"

He ran his fingers through his hair, and stared at me for a couple seconds, appearing just as unable to believe who he was seeing as I was.

"Ummm...my manager's idea...you know, make random appearances...he says it's good for my career...but...oh god..."

With no warning at all, he just grabbed me and wrapped his arms around me. For a second I just stood there, but after the shock wore away, I wrapped an arm around him.

He let go and whispered,

"Sorry...I don't know why I...I just...I thought something happened to you...when I saw you on TV I just..."

Felicia was standing off to the side, her head tilted, staring at Jake with her mouth open.

"Oh, this is my friend Felicia...sorry I can't pronounce your last name." I started laughing and supported myself by putting my hand on her shoulder.

"Gorski." She said, laughing just as hard as I was.

Jake held out his hand and she shook it, and even after he took it away, she held her hand out in front of her, staring at it.

"Umm...how would you like to go get something to eat...these people are kinda freaking me out." Jake said, staring at the store employees, who had started to surround us, looking ready to pounce.

"Yeah, sure...come on Felicia." I said, desperately wanting to change my clothes, as I noticed the photographers standing outside the store.

"Run!!" Jake yelled, and we all dashed through the doorway, sprinting across the parking lot, laughing. We all climbed into my car, as Jake had arrived by chauffeur, and the man had disappeared.

He got in the driver's seat, and I climbed into the middle, with Felicia next to me.

"Nice car." Jake commented.

"Thanks." I said, handing him the keys.

He started the car, and pulled out of the parking lot, going around a couple corner's before he was sure he had lost the few photographer's who had been following us.

He pulled into the parking lot of an Italian restaurant, after finally accepting that neither Felicia nor I cared where we went. They both got out and waited while I climbed into the back seat and changed my clothes.

I climbed out, adjusting my sunglasses, and noticed Jake staring at me.

"What?" I asked.

"Nothing." He quickly replied, turning away, pretending he had not been staring.

We went inside, and after getting the waitress to stop staring at Jake long enough to seat us, we started talking. I filled Jake in what had happened in my life since I last saw him.

"So now...I'm on my way to New York...to see...him."

"Why?" He asked, his tone surprising me, having gone from quiet and understanding to loud and confused.

"Because...well...I guess...I just thought that...maybe if I talked to him...it would fill the empty hole inside me." I answered, scanning my menu and finally deciding to get the same thing as Jake.

The waitress came to get our orders, and the food came, without Jake saying anything. Felicia sat next to me looking from Jake to me and back again, wondering when somebody would say something.

"Have...have you seen Lilly or Oliver?" Jake asked awkwardly.

"Umm...yeah, when I was in California a while ago..." I answered.

"I'm gonna go use the bathroom." Felicia said loudly, alerting us of her presense.

She got up and walked past me, before turning around and walking the other way.

"Bathroom's this way." She mumbled.

"Miley." Jake said, loudly, clearly bursting at the seems to say whatever is was he would soon be telling me.

"When you go...to the prison...I'm coming with you."

"What? No, Jake, you don't have to...I mean, I'm sure you've got more important stuff to do..." I added, seeing the disappointed look on his face.

"No, I want to. I'm going. End of story." He said, and air of finality in his voice.

"Ok...if you want to..."

He set his fork down on his place, and I said,

"We should probably get the bill..."

Twenty minutes later we were on the highway, heading upstate, as the clouds started covering the sky, blocking out the sunlight. With my wig off, and my hair blowing around outside the window, which I had rolled down, I started getting tired. Felicia had offered to sit in the back, clearly thinking there was something going on between Jake and I.

_Well she's wrong. _I thought to myself.

_Is she? _I asked myself.

_Yes, she's definately wrong._

But then, looking at Jake a he drove down the road, I started thinking maybe I was wrong.

_I've got Avery though. _The voice in my head was telling me. But that didn't seem relevant at the moment.

It started getting darker and I started getting sleepier.

_"Somebody hold her down!" Somebody was yelling, as I kept sliding off the bed at the hospital. I couldn't hold myself up, and kept falling to the floor. __I was laughing hysterically, and kept growling at the doctor standing in front of me. A man grabbed my arm and shoved me back onto the bed, but this made me angry. I swung my arm at him, but missed by inches, the alcohol having impaired my vision. He held me down on the bed, and I didn't like it. I started screaming, threatening him within an inch of his life, until more people came in and held me down. Soon the doctor was forcing what I vaguely remember him saying was charcoal, down my throught._

_"Eww..." I kept repeating, continually caughing, trying to spit it up._

_"Where's Avery? I kept asking._

_"He's waiting outside." The doctor kept saying, but I continued to ask him anyway._

_"Why? he said he wouldn't leave me...why'd he leave me?" I started yelling._

_"He didn't leave you, he's right outside." The doctor told me._

_"Why?" I asked, before the charcoal made it all the way down and started forcing me to throw up._

_When I was finally finished, the nurses steered me down the hallway and helped me into a bed, before I threw up on one of them, and they left to get cleaned up. _

_Soon, Avery was in the room._

_"Why'd you leave me?" I asked him._

_"I didn't," He said, "I love you."_

_"Oh...ok...but..." I started to say._

_"Avery." I whispered._

_"Yeah?" He asked me, his face coming in and out of focus as I stared at him._

_"Don't kill me." _

"Miley." Jake was whispering in my ear.

I opened my eyes and looked up, expecting to see the roof of my car...but instead, I saw the ceiling of a hotel room.

"Huh?" I said, disoriented, as I blinked a couple times, before asking,

"Where am I?"

"Holiday Inn." He answered.

"We got to New York this morning, so I took you to the first Hotel I found."

"Oh...thanks..." I said.

Felicia walked into the room, staring at her phone, looking confused.

"Their coming? Why are they coming?" She was whispering to herself.

"Who?" Jake and I asked at the same time.

"My...parents." She said, sitting down on the foot of my bed.

Just then, somebody was beating at the door.

"No." She said, before getting off my bed and moving towards the door.

Jake dropped to the floor, hiding behind my bed, as I got up and followed her.

She opened the door, and standing right behind it, sure enough, were her parents.

"Mom? Dad?" She asked, looking even more confused.

"Honey...you need to come home, we don't feel comfortable with you being alone with..." They looked up and noticed me standing there. They just stared, and I knew exactly what they were thinking.

Twenty minutes later, after much complaining, and trying to convince her parents, unsuccessfully, that I was perfectly sane, and that she was safe being here with me, Felicia's parents had drug her out of the room and back to the car.

Did I really come off that way? If Felicia's parents thought I was dangerous to be around, what did everyone else back home think of me?

I couldn't go back. I was better of staying here, with Jake.

What would I tell Avery?

My dad and Linda?

What about Daken?

Maybe I was dangerous. What if I was insane? maybe I fried so many of my brain cells that night with Avery that I couldn't tell the difference between reality and imagination anymore. It wouldn't be safe for everyone back home if I went back.

_What about Jake_? I asked myself.

_Would he be safe around me?_

He wouldn't care. He didn't before.

He loved me before.

"I guess it's just you and me now." He told me, clearly wondering what I was thinking.

**_Ok, now I'm kinda not getting the point of bringing Felicia into this story...I kinda wish I hadn't now...she's just supposed to be her friend...but yeah, well, REVIEW...NOW!!!!!!!! Please? lol _**


	16. Chapter 16

**_ok I'm trying, but this isn't turning out right...you gotta give me a chance though...please don't give up on me!! Thanks to everyone who reviewed...which was...8 people I think...or maybe it was 7...but thats almost the most I've gotten on any chapter of this so far..._**

"Umm...yeah...I guess so..." I said, staring at the door, still in shock.

Jake stood behind me, waiting for me to say something else, but my brain wasn't working. It was like someone hit the off switch, and I couldn't find it to turn it back on.

Suddenly, words formed in my head, and I turn around to face Jake.

"I can't go back...what am I gonna do?"

"Why _can't_ you go back?" He asked, sounding almost like he wanted me to, and for a moment, I feared that he did.

But instead of staying calm, like I wanted to, anger consumed my entire body. I tried as hard as I could to hold it in, but it was like squeezing a water balloon, eventually it pops and some water just spills out.

"So you wan't me to go? Thanks Jake, that makes me feel so much better, why don't I just go shoot myself and get out of your way." I hissed, laying down on the bed and closing my eyes.

"No! No that's not what I meant...I - All I _- Stupid!, stupid stupid!" _Jake started smacking his forehead with the palm of his hand, and I had to get up and force him to stop, over a chorus _of Stupid stupid stupid!_

"Jake! Stop it." I said calmly, after I finally had him up against the wall, pinning him to it by the wrists.

I let go of him and he sat down on the bed, looking down at his feet. After a couple minutes silence, he finally spoke up.

"So...what...what was that about?" He asked.

I sat down next to him and joined him in his staring contest.

"Well..." I started, looking up from his feet, "I'm guessing that they probably heard what happened at my house, right before I left...and...maybe about my..._" _

I looked into his eyes and pulled my feet up onto the bed, sitting cross-legged.

"_condition." _I whispered.

He nodded, knowing perfectly well what my condition was. Jake was one of the few that knew I was on medication for both Psychosis and Schizophrenia, not to mention the sleeping pills I had to take nearly every night to keep nightmares from swimming in and out of my brain.

I looked back down at my feet and started picking at the nail polish on my toenails.

"Not...not that it's bad or anything...I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm over it...just...I keep seeing..." For lack of a better word, I decided on what to say next. "weird...things...I think it might be the Schizophrenia...it's not as bad as...well, Johnny Depp in that one movie, where he thought that guy was murdering everybody, and it turned out it was him, and he was just...loony..."

"You're _not_ loony..."

"Who said I was?" I asked, laughing, looking up at him again.

"I...just...you said..." He started stammering again.

I put my hand on his leg, and he looked up from his feet, which he was staring at again.

"I was kidding." I said, as I felt shivers run up my arm, and pulled it away.

"Oh..." He said.

Jake was silent again, this time for a longer amount of time. I absentmindedly scratched my ear, and got up off the bed.

I went into the bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror for a while. I couldn't remember the last time I had seen my own reflection. I looked thinner than I remembered, my hair was even longer, although much more dry and brittle. I reminded myself to get a haircut as soon as possible.

My face was sunburned, although I couldn't envisage why that would be, considering I hadn't been outside very much in the last three years.

The words _drinking _and _Avery _came to my mind, and I figured they probably had something to do with it.

_If only I could remember that night..._ I thought.

The dream I had in the car on my way to New York came to mind, and I thought about it for a minute.

_Maybe that was what really happened._ I thought out loud.

_But what did I mean by "Please don't kill me?"_

The door to the bathroom squeaked, and my name came from that direction.

"Yes?" I asked.

"Umm...so...what's the plan?" Jake asked, looking strangely uncomfortable.

"The plan..." I said out loud, mostly to myself.

"I wanna go...to the prison." I announced, looking up at Jake's shocked face.

"Now."

"I'm going with you." He said, turning around.

I grabbed ahold of his sleeve and said,

"No. You're not. I need to do this alone."

"Oh no, I'm going with you, that bastard is gonna get his ass kicked."

"No way, Jake, do you wanna end up being his cell mate? I can tell you from experience, he doesn't keep a clean room...he's worse than Jackson...Linda always said she thought she'd have to wear a Hazmat suit the next time she went in his room."

He obviously didn't find me funny, and just stared.

"You're not going." I said, with an air of finality.

And with that, I pushed past him into the room, grabbed my purse, and left, leaving him standing in the doorway.

* * *

Sitting in the visitor's area, waiting, staring at the phone in front of me, and the glass window behind it, I thought back, unwillingly, to the reason I was here, why I was visiting, and what the vistee had done to be banished to this strange place. 

I looked up and noticed him hobbling into the room, helped by two security guards. He was much smaller than I remembered him, and his skin had a greenish tint to it, as if he were sick, and I reminded myself, he probably was. His hair was thinner, and had streaks of grey in it.

_It's amazing how much a place like this ages you_. I thought to myself.

He sat down on the other side of the glass and picked up the phone. I picked up the other and slowly brought it to my ear.

He said nothing.

"Umm..." I said.

"Never thought I'd see you here." He said, his voice much lower than I remembered it.

"Well, the guys at the front desk were pretty surprised to see me. Aparently they know all about you." I said, much more calmly than I had expected.

"The people here immerse themselves in matters that do not concern them. They know everything, about everybody."

"They've got to have something to do, I'd think this wood be a terrible job, having to watch over scum like you all day."

He just smiled at me.

"I won't be here long. I've got bronchitus, and the cancer's taking over my brain, the doctors say I have no more than two months left. I thank you for that."

"Nothing I can do will help you. I wouldn't want to anyways."

"That's fine with me. I did something terrible, and I'd rather die than sit in here for the next twenty five years thinking about it."

"So...you're..._sorry_?" I asked, disbelieving his words. The Ben I knew didn't know what remorse was.

"Should I not be?" He asked, before coughing into his elbow.

I was silent for a minute, hand-picking the words I would say next, while staring at my fingernails.

"If you weren't in here...what would you do with your last days?"

"...I would make the people I care about most happy. There's no use making up for the bad things I've done. They're done and there's no going back. I couldn't fix them If I wanted."

I was silent again, storing what he had said in my memory.

"Why?" He asked suddenly, breaking the silence.

"...Because, I get the feeling...that I don't have much time left." I looked up at him again.

"Maybe you don't." He replied, his head down and his eyes closed.

He looked up and whispered,

"Miley?"

My hatred for the dying man in front of me boiled at the sound of him saying my name, and blocked my throat. However, I managed to ask one word.

"Yes?"

"Can you tell my mom...goodbye...for me?"

He looked extremely tired, and started coughing again.

"I'll try." I answered.

Ben continued coughing, and the security guards helped him up and escorted him back to his cell.

If he hadn't been who he was...I would feel sorry for him.

* * *

Sitting on a park bench in complete darkness, the phone call I had gotten several hours before rang in my ears, replaying. 

_"Hey, Miley...how are you doing?" Oliver's voice came from the phone._

_"Oh...ok." I replied, wondering whether or not to tell him where I was._

_"I won't be around tomorrow...so I wanted to tell you happy birthday...I was gonna leave a message...but you're awake, so..."_

_"I'm in New York." I said._

_"Why?" He asked me._

_"I was just at the prison...he's dying."_

_"Who? Ohhhh..." Classic Oliver, forgetting about something like this._

_"Why did you go?" He asked._

_"I thought coming here would accomplish something."_

_"And did it? He asked._

_"I don't know."_

I looking down at the smiling face of my watch, telling me it was 11:43.

_Should I go home?_

_Or_

_Should I just stay on this park bench for the rest of my miserable life?_

_Circle the correct answer._

_WRONG_

_Trick Question._

* * *

Standing outside the door to room 523, my hand on the doorknob. 

Wondering whether or not I should go in.

I open the door, and darkness consumes me.

I step, in, and close the door, the small chink of light disappearing and plunging the room into total darkness again.

11:56 The clock on the DVD player tells me, flashing.

Uneven breathing comes from the bed. He's not sleeping. No snoring.

I lay down on the bed next to him, pulling the sheets up over me.

"Jake? What I said when I left Malibu. About needing to get away from you...about you making it worse? I was lying. I'm a terrible, horrible, no good, liar." I told him.

11:58 The clock tells me.

"I knew that all along, Miley." He says.

11:59

11:59

11:59

11:59

I sit up and lean over him, staring into the shadow that is his face. He knows what I want, even in the dark.

"It's illegal." He whispers.

I look at the clock.

12:00

12:00

12:00

"Not anymore."

**_Grr...I'm so mad, I was almost done, and I went to save this, and it told me I had to log in again...so I had to retype the whole last half. It was better before..._**


	17. Chapter 17

**_Ok, so I updated my profile a bit...added a poll thing...mostly cuz I just felt like it, and I'm kinda curious of how many people would actually vote lol._**

**_ok ummm...READER DISCRETION ADVISED...it's not terribly bad...but if you're like, 10...it is rated "T" though so you can't say anything, you're the one that clicked._**

**_Disclaimer: ummm...lets see...oh, yes the song is Way Back into Love from the Movie Music and Lyrics_**

A dimmed street lamp below the window flickers back on, shoving the reluctant light into the room, and falling across Jake's face.

He was sitting up all the way, supporting himself with his hands positioned behind his back. I slid my leg over him and sat on his knees.

"How can you possibly want to-"

I kissed him.

"-do this right now? I mean-" He continued, as if he hadn't been interrupted.

I kissed him again, this time, even harder.

"-are you insane?"

My lips froze on his neck, and I could tell that he knew he had said the wrong thing.

I sat up, staring into his face, which now looked extremely frightened.

He looked scared, as if he expected

me to take out a gun

andshoothimdead.

Don't get mad I told myself but It didn't work and I WAS mad and I tried to hold it back but it didn't work and it didn't work and I was ANGRY.

"I am." I said calmly.

"I am insane and you have known it FOREVER. I was NEVER normal! And you told me you liked that about me! I was weird from the moment I was born...when I was Hannah...when..."

He knew what I was thinking of and I knew what HE was thinking.

And I told him what I thought he was thinking.

"If she can pay the Secretary of State enough to get her license back, why can't she afford a good therapist? That's what you're thinking. I TRIED Jake. I went from shrink to shrink to shrink and NOBODY HELPED ME!!"

This was a lie, but I was angry and lies were like flattened speed bumps on Miley's Anger Street.

"I thought YOU could help me...but you don't WANT to!!"

I was screaming, and he looked strangely calm.

He let me continue like a screaming teapot left on the stove for too long.

I was screaming unintelligible words at him and he couldn't understand me.

But _I_ couldn't understand me so how could _he?"_

And

the

screaming

STOPPED.

I slid from the bed and went straight to the bathroom.

_Wash it away._ I told myself

_Wash it all away._

I turned on the shower, and water burst from the shower head and sprinkled my arm and the top of my head.

The tank top I was wearing was yanked over my head, and the skirt I was wearing was thrown on the floor, and everything else was on the floor in a small pile underneath a towel that had fallen on top if them when I had thrown everything in the corner.

I stepped into the shower.

The scary shower.

The scary scary shower.

Like a song.

It was a different song though, it WASN'T a scary song.

And it was coming from me.

"I've been hiding all my hopes and dreams away. Just in case I ever need them again someday.

I've been setting aside time, to clear a little space in the corners of my mind."

I sang, the water squirting into my mouth and making me sound funny.

I couldn't remember all the words, and mumbled the few parts that I knew.

"I've been watching but the stars refuse to shine. I've been searching but I just don't see the signs.

I know that it's out there. There's got to be something for my soul somewhere."

Jake wasn't coming. He wasn't going to apologize.

And

I thought

he would.

"All I want to do is find a way back into love. I can't make it through without a way back into love.

And if I open my heart to you, I'm hoping you'll show me what to do,

And if you help me to start again, you know that I'll be there for you in the end."

The shower song ended, due to my lack of knowledge of the words. I started humming.

_Squeak_

The door.

There were hands on the shower curtain. Shadow hands. The looked like the tiny designs that were supposed to be there.

I reached out and matched my hands up with the shadow hands.

The hands were warm.

And then they were gone, and he was in the shower.

He said everything I wanted to hear without opening his mouth.

A silent speech maker.

The water was spraying the back of his head, dripping through his hair. It was in his face but he could see me.

I reached behind him and adjusted the shower head so that it now sprayed his back.

With the same hand I brushed his hair out of his eyes

and he leaned forward

and our

lips

met.

It was weird, yet perfectly normal.

His hands were holding up the wall behind me, and mine were playing with the bottom of his shirt. I lifted it up and he let go of the wall for a second, allowing me to pull it off and toss it over the shower curtain rod.

He reached for the falling wall and my hands were on his sides.

He pulled away and his fingers were running along my shoulder, pausing on the bullet wound scar he knew.

They moved down to the huge scar splattered across my chest.

He looked up at me, with questioning eyes.

"Lab accident in Illinois." I explained.

"Well...I pretty sure she_ meant _to do it."

He shook his head, not believing it.

His fingers moved up to four small dots right below my collarbone.

"Fork...New York." I explained.

His fingers moved to the large L on my stomach.

He traced the letters

L

E

A

V

E

Not even bothering to ask.

I'm glad he didn't.

I reached for his fingers and closed the gap between our lips again.

**_ok, I'm pretty sure that's the worst (sexual stuff-wise) it's gonna get, so you can open your eyes and unplug your ears now lol._**

**_But yeah, this is totally off topic, well, kinda, but I would definitely recommend watching Music and Lyrics...it's way better than it looks...and funny lol (Nobody grows up in Florida!...Unless you're an orange...) _**

**_Ah yes, well..._****_Check out my poll thing...and REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!_**


	18. Chapter 18

**_wow this is like, the most I've updated in a week for like, a year...I have never noticed how much I say "like" until now...lol it's just part of our funny Midwestern accents I guess, we all do it...but the totally thing...that's definitely not us..._**

**_I officially have 4 votees lol and not one of them chose die lol someones gonna do it...I would._**

Tap.

Tap tap tap.

Tap tap.

Tap tap tap tap.

I give up on my finger tapping song, and rest my hand on the small table in the corner of the room that I'm sitting at. Next to the milk carton, which now has maybe enough milk to fill a teaspoon.

I take up a new hobby. I call it Jake-watching.

Like birdwatching, only you don't need binoculars.

And you don't have to do those stupid bird calls that get all those weirdos spots on the Today Show or Good Morning America.

And only _I _can do it.

He's mine.

I stare at him, sleeping with his hand flung over his face, covering his nose. He's snoring.

Jake coughs, I move my hand to my knee.

Jake stops snoring, I pick at the unraveling seam on my shorts.

Jake starts snoring again. I'm getting bored.

I just want to stand on top of this chair and dive on top of him.

"Wake up!" I want to scream.

But Jake's snoring continues, and so does my boredom.

I start humming again.

Every

single

Hannahsong

I can remember.

There's only one I can't.

Best of Both Worlds.

_Why _can't I remember that one?

You get the limo out front. Hottest styles, every shoe, every color.

Yeah, when you're famous it can be kinda fun. It's really you but no one ever discovers.

Pictures and autographs-

No.

That's the third verse...is it?

_Why can't I remember?_

It's so easy. It's basically my theme song.

I find myself whispering the words, trying to remember.

"In some ways you're just like all your friends, but on stage you're a star."

Jake's sitting up staring at me with that look on his face. The one that says he's thinking about laughing at you, but hasn't decided yet.

"That's it." I say, smiling at him.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome." He answers.

I bite my lip and stare at my knees. My patellas. Attached to the Femur...and the Tibia, and the Fibula.

How does that bone song go?

The foot bone's connected to the, leg bone, the leg bone's connected to the, hip bone, the hip bone's connected to the...

"You feel guilty don't you?"

Jake breaks me out of my stupor, beaming me back to earth, taking me away from planet Miley Sings Songs About Bones in Her Head and Completely Ignores the Huge Problem In Front of Her.

"...Yes...I feel guilty that...I don't feel guilty...if that makes sense."

"It does. It's weird but it makes sense." Jake says.

I look up at him and he starts cracking his knuckles.

"We shouldn't of-"

"No." I say.

"It was supposed to happen."

Jake grabs a pair of sweat pants lying on the side table and gets out of bed. He pulls them on and sits down on the floor in front of me, crossing his legs.

I feel impelled to say "Be quiet kiddies, it's story time."

"And how do you know that?" He asks, grabbing ahold of my bare foot, stroking it with his index finger.

"I just do."

"Oh so now you get to call all the shots?" He asks, smiling.

I pull my foot away from him and say,

"Yes. I do."

"Why's that?" He asks, staring up at me.

"Just because."

With no warning whatsoever, Jake grabs ahold of my legs and

pulls

me

totheground.

Lying across his lap blinded by my hair, slashed across my face, I feel around for his hand.

"What was that for?" I ask him when I find it.

"Just because."

I sit up and run my fingers through my hair.

"Let's go." I say.

"Why?" He asks.

"Hannah needs some exercise."

* * *

Fifteen minutes and three pairs of sunglasses later, Jake and I are in the elevator, heading down to the lobby. 

"What are you doing?" I ask Jake, who's staring at my neck concentrating on something unknown.

"Counting your freckles."

"You have thirteen freckles on your neck. That's unlucky. Especially in an elevator."

"Thank you, I'll go get a sunburn and get my good luck back then...why are you counting my freckles?"

"Elevator's too slow." He explains.

The elevator stops and Jake grabs my hand.

He pulls me out and across the lobby, past all the staring people, their heads tilted to the side, probably thinking "Is that who I think it is?"

Right in front of the hotel is a man standing on the side of the road with his keys in his hand, hailing a taxi.

I take a look at his keys and notice the **pink **rabbit's foot key chain attached to them.

_Please tell me those are his wife's. _I think to myself.

Apparently Jake noticed this small detail too, because he starts yelling "Dermy!" every time the man calls for a taxi.

"Taxi!"

"Dermy!"

"Taxi!"

"Dermy!"

"Jake, shut up!" I whisper, laughing.

The man has no clue and just keeps looking at us strangely.

"Let's go." Jake says, like he _wasn't_ planning on standing here making dead animal stuffing jokes for the next twenty minutes.

He takes ahold of my hand again and we walk.

And walk.

And walk.

And

Walk.

Eventually, we end up in a park.

I stare up at the trees over head and ignore the people with cameras that have just realized who we are.

I can just see the headlines now.

JAKE AND HANNAH BACK TOGETHER

THE _REAL_ REASON HANNAH LEFT and then some photo-shopped picture of me looking _extremely _pregnant.

Or maybe some incredulous story about how I was abducted by aliens and Jake saved me.

The weird thing is, I could sit in a park with anybody else for six hours and I would probably be bored to the point of wanting to pick up one of the fallen branches and shoving it through my ear, but with Jake...

I had

thetimeofmylife.

Which is what made me think.

Back at the hotel room, I turned to Jake as he flipped the lights on.

"I have to go home." I told him.

"Fix things up at home...then...I'll come back for you."

He didn't say anything at first.

He opened his mouth...shut it...opened it again...shut it.

Opened his mouth.

Shutitagain.

"Ok." He said.

I crossed the room and started gathering all my things.

"Now? You're leaving now?"

"I need to feel right...about this." I said.

He knew I was going back to get rid of Avery. I felt really bad about doing this to him, but Avery and I didn't fit. We were like two puzzle pieces, each from a different puzzle. There was no chance we'd ever fit.

Jake and I...I was one piece of the puzzle and Jake was all the other pieces.

I took my keys off the table and turned to Jake.

I kissed him, harder than I ever had, and broke away, my hand on the doorknob.

"I love you." He said.

I said nothing.

I'd have time later.

**_Strangely enough, I'm kinda proud of this chapter..._**

**_Just remember...if the world didn't suck, we'd all fall off!!!_**


	19. Chapter 19

**_All righty...back to typing in slow motion lol, this is kinda weird, but every time there's a pause in a sentence, I have to stop typing for a second...lol whatever, anyways, on with the story._**

It's dark.

"It's dark!" The trees yell at me.

"It's dark out, it's dark out, it's dark out!" The birds tweet.

I run my finger along the side of my car before wrapping my fingers around the handle and pulling it open.

I put everything in the back seat and sit down in the front. I put my keys in the ignition, but I don't turn the car on. I stare up at the hotel, looking for a window that might have Jake looking out.

I can't find him, but my finger find the keys. The car is on, and I'm gone.

Hours later, I turn onto Bunker Hill Drive and start heading toward my house, worrying about what my dad and Linda will say.

I already deleted the 113 messages on my cell phone from either my dad, Linda, or Avery, without listening to them.

There were two other messages. One from Lilly, singing me happy birthday like she has for the last three years. The other was from Felicia.

Apologizing for her parent's behavior, wishing me a Happy Eighteenth Birthday.

Apologizing again.

I deleted them both and wondered whether I'd be welcome here.

About fifteen yards from my driveway, I see something in the ditch.

It's Jason. He looks sick. Jason waves. I don't.

I move down the road and turn into our driveway. When I get to the top, there are lights flashing, and a man with a black coat on is helping some men lift something in a black bag into the back of a ambulance.

There's no hope for whoever's in the black bag. The blackjacketman's coat says CORONER.

I slam the car into park and run into the house.

The first thing I see is Daken, running at me with a huge smile on his face. No noise though. No "Mommy!!" Nothing.

"Hey! Where've you been?" Linda asks, coming around a corner. It's weird though, because she doesn't sound angry at all, more curious.

"Umm...New York." I answered, waiting for the lion to come after the lamb.

"Oh." She says.

"What's going on out there?" I ask her, pointing out the window.

"Oh..." Her tone changes, she seems more herself.

"You know that boy, Jason, the one that helped us remodel the upstairs? The one we thought skipped town? They found him in that well in the back of our property. Said he must've been there for months."

"What? No that's impossible, I just saw him at the end of the driveway just now."

She smiles at me and asks,

"Did you put sugar in your coffee this morning?"

And

justlikethat

she walks away.

I go upstairs, looking for my dad.

It looks just like it did before the fire. Even the crack in the wall is the same.

The doorknob of the room on the end, my room, calls to me, so I answer it. My room looks the same. Exactly the same.

"Dad!" I call down the hall.

"Yes?" He asks, and suddenly,

he's standing

rightbehindme.

"You already fixed my room?" I ask him.

"What needed fixin'?" He asked me.

Ok, this is just plain weird. It's like I went back in time, only to find that everybody was different.

I lay down on my bed and close my eyes, hoping that when I wake up, I'll find myself lying in ashes, with the sun peeking in at me.

_"How does it feel to be 18?" Jake asks._

_"I don't know...how do **you** feel about it?" I reply, smiling, a real smile, for the first time in a while._

_"I feel..." He leans over and kisses me under the trees."Like I can do that without getting arrested. Those cops really come down hard on us superstars."_

_"Yeah, that's why O.J.'s not in prison." I answered, and he laughed._

The scene changed, to one I'd want to remember forever.

_I had my back up against the wall, right outside the bathroom, with my hair still wet, and Jake not making it any drier. His mouth all over my neck, and I'm basically asleep._

But before I can register what's actually happens, I wake up.

Everything is the same. No ashes. Nothing out of the ordinary.

The sun is shining through my window, and an idea pops into my head. A weird one.

I decided to go see Dennis Berkley.

I guess I figured getting the crap beat out of him by my boyfriend made him a person of interest.

Surprisingly, the crappy hospital in this town lets me in to see him, even though I'm not a close friend or relative.

I pinch myself as I walk into the nearly unoccupied room, thinking that I'm probably dreaming, because this could not be any easier.

"Hi." He croaks.

Dennis Berkley was probably pretty cute, underneath all those bruises, but I couldn't tell when I went to see him. His eyes were nearly swollen shut, and his head was wrapped in bandages.

"Who are you?" His raspy voice come out of his face, which looked like a giant peach, being compressed by a couple rubber bands.

"If I told you, you would probably kick me out." I said.

"You're not Avery Tiesman. You didn't beat me. I don't care who you are."

"Yeah, well, Avery's my boyfri--wait a minute...did you say Tiesman?"

"Yes...he's your boyfriend and you don't even know his last name?"

"Well...he said his last name was...Swank..."

_"Oh, I'm Avery...uh, Swank, yeah, sorry, I forgot my last name."_

Dennis starts laughing, and even though he's clearly in pain, it doesn't look like it's bothering him.

"What's so funny?" I asked, stepping further into the room.

"How well do you know him?"

"Well...I..."

"Obviously not very well...you see, rumor around town is...well...you probably don't wanna hear it..."

"No, I do." I begged him to go on.

"Well...This family that lived in that farm house on the corner of Bunker Hill and Crosby...the Tiesman family...they had been here forever, but nobody really knew them well...but about four years ago...the firemen were called out to their house...It was in flames...and suposedly, the whole family was inside."

He paused and I motioned for him to continue.

"Well, after they put out the fire, they found four people inside...dead...the father and the mother...they had had their throats slashed...the sister, she had been drowned in the bathtub...and the oldest boy...well, they couldn't really tell, but they thought he had been stabbed and caught on fire...and the only one to get out alive was...Avery...he says he was out of town, visiting an aunt...but everyone thinks he killed them...well except for Joe and Bennett...but everyone knows a headless pig has more brains than those two."

I just stared at him, wondering why this didn't surprise me as much as It should have.

I made a mental note to stay sa far away from Avery as I could.

_A text message breakup may not be very classy...but it's probably the safest_. I thought to myself.

"You'd be better off without him."

"I've been thinking that for a while." I said.

"And...if you see him...tell him I've got a restraining order against him...and that the police are looking for him."

"I don't think I'll see him for a while." I replied, before leaving the room.

Back at the house, I went straight to my room, passing both my dad and Linda without a word, and crawled into bed, with Daken curled up with his back pressed against my stomache.

I wrapped my arms around him tighter as the early morning light came through my window the next day, and tried to get back to sleep.

But I was interrupted.

My phone was ringing, so I picked it up.

Lilly, the bearer of bad news she was, was on the other end.

She was crying.

"Lilly?" I answered.

"Oh my god...Miley...It's just terrible...I can't believe...I can't imagine how you must feel, if all those magazine articles are telling the truth..."

"Lilly? What are you talking about?" I asked, worrying that she was going to tell me something really bad.

"You...you don't know?" She asked.

"Know _what_?" I asked her anxiously.

"It's...it's on channel six right now." She said, and abruptly hung up.

I raced down the stairs and flipped on the TV.

I hit the six button on the remote and stopped breathing.

Beneath a picture of Jake, a man was talking, with a solemn look on his face.

"The whole country is in mourning today, having lost beloved Zombie Slayer Jake Ryan late last night." The man said.

"According to Sergeant Chet Turner of the New York Police Department, Mr. Ryan was found with his throat slashed in a Manhattan hotel room. Reportedly, Ryan had rented out two rooms at the Holiday Inn earlier this week, which he shared with none other than his ex girlfriend, Hannah Montana. Miss Montana had been seen leaving the hotel in a hurry only hours before Mr. Ryan was found. At the moment, she is wanted for questioning."

I let out a scream.

It was dark.

**_Ok, I really didn't wanna murder Jake...but I felt I had to...so...I'm sorry..._**


	20. Chapter 20

**_Ok...ummm...I think there'll be maybe 1 or 2 more chapters...I'm still not convinced I'll do the third one...most people would probably end it after this one...so if I do do a third one, it'll be a while before it's up._**

**_Disclaimer: Ummm...the song, minus like, ten words that I changed, is Stop & Stare by OneRepublic._**

I hate is when people say sorry.

They don't _actually _know how you feel. They just want you to quit crying, or complaining, or whatever it is that you're doing that they don't like.

"I'm sorry." They say.

"I'm so sorry."

And then those stupid little smiles. You don't want them to smile! You want them to be just a miserable as you are!

But they're not.

I watch hundreds of people I know, standing in line, tell Jake's dad how sorry they are.

He smiles at each one of them.

What a jerk.

I just stand in the corner. I'm not going through the line. I'm not sorry for him. I'm sorry for Jake.

And I can't tell him that.

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see the closed casket. I don't think Jake would have cared if he looked disgusting. I think he'd want people to have seen him. But his dad did care, and when I arrived at the visitation earlier that week, the casket was closed.

I had cried enough at home. I was over it. At least I thought so.

I bit my lip as I looked around the room.

There was a man walking towards me, pulling something out of his pocket.

A police badge.

Great, I'm getting arrested at a funeral.

"Hello, I'm Officer Pavilion. You look familiar..."

"Miley Stewart." I told him.

"I'm one of Jake's-"

"Ex-girlfriends."

The only one that showed up. I wasn't surprised Mikayla hadn't shown up. She probably couldn't fake a frown as good as she can a smile...or talent.

"Yeah." I said.

"When was the last time you saw Mr. Ryan?" Officer HP Pavilion asked me...

I decided now was not the time to lie. Whoever did this needed to be caught.

"Umm...Last week, in New York...I was with him at the hotel for a while."

"Ah...you were...who else was with you?"

"Umm...one of my friends...but she left early...and Hannah."

I needed to clear suspicion.

If one of me was put in prison, so was the other. That is the downside in having an alter ego.

"Ah..." Said Officer Computer.

"So..."

"Hannah left right before me." I said, which mostly, was true.

"So who could've done this?" He asked.

"Ummm..." I had an idea.

"I have no idea."

After a couple more pointless questions, People started speaking.

They thought they knew him. Told all these stories. The didn't know him. Not the real him.

One person in this room did, and she had sewn her lips shut.

An hour later, I stood on the edge of the crowd around Jake's grave. I still wasn't crying, and Officer Pavilion was giving me weird looks. People were leaving, and I was still standing there. I didn't want to see them lower him into the ground, but I couldn't move. My feet were glued to the ground.

A woman tapped me on the shoulder and motioned for me to leave, so I did.

I laid on the floor in my hotel room, staring at the ceiling, I piece of paper lying on my chest, and a pencil stuck in my hair.

I sat up and put a couple more words on the paper, before breaking down and layig down again.

I lay on the floor, humming, and occasionally writing something down, for a couple more hours.

I shivered and pulled a blanket off the bed.

I wrapped it around myself and changed a couple words. I looked out the window.

It was dark now. I looked at the clock.

2:13

That's why.

I pulled on a jacket and slipped some shoes on, before leaving the room.

After sneaking into the cemetary, which was probably tthe most difficult thing I had done in my entire life, I found Jake's grave. The dirt was wet, and the grass around it was dead.

I sat down right in the middle of the grave.

"I wrote you a song." I said.

No answer.

"You used to love it when I sang to you."

No answer.

I looked around and lay down on the grave, covering my frontside in dirt and grass seed.

I opened my mouth, and quietly, I sang.

_"This town is colder now, I think it's sick of me  
It's time to make my move, I'm shakin off the rust  
I've got my heart set on anywhere but here  
I'm staring down myself, counting up the years  
Steady hands, just take the wheel...  
And every glance is killing me  
Time to make one last appeal... for the life I lead_

_Stop and stare  
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere  
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared  
But I've become what I can't be, oh  
Stop and stare  
I start to wonder why I'm here not there  
And I'd give anything to get what's fair  
But fair ain't what you really need  
Oh, can you see what I see" _

I paused listening for any sign of a guard, but there was none.

_"They're tryin to come back, all my senses push  
Un-tie the weight bags, I never thought I could...  
Steady feet, don't fail me now  
Gonna run till I can't walk  
But something pulls my focus out  
And I'm standing down..._

_Stop and stare  
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere  
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared  
But I've become what I can't be, oh  
Stop and stare  
I start to wonder why I'm here not there  
And I'd give anything to get what's fair  
But fair ain't what you really need  
Oh, you don't need"_

I lowered my voice, and picked up a rock off the ground.

_"What you need, what you need..._

_Stop and stare  
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere  
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared  
But I've become what I can't be  
Oh, do you see what I see..."_

I looked up at stared at the stone.

JAKE RYAN

1992-2010

BELOVED SON, FRIEND, AND ZOMBIE SLAYER.

They just _had _to put Zombie Slayer.

At the bottom of the stone, it said,

Tragedy is just another day

What did that mean?

It sounded to me, like losing him meant nothing.

It meant something to me.

I started crying.

And crying

And crying.

The tears poured out like they never had before. If I didn't stop soon, I'd probably wash him out of his grave.

I squeezed the rock in my hand and stood up. I kneeled on the other side of the tombstone and used the sharp stone to carve words into the back of it.

Twenty minutes later, I had finished.

I leaned back to see what I had wrote.

_I love you too Jake_

I thought it was enough. It would've meant a lot to him.

**_ok, it'll probably be a couple days before the next chapter's up, I'm hurrying through this to finish, but I won't have any time for the next couple days...but that doesn't stop you from REVIEWING!!!!!!!_**


	21. Chapter 21

**_ok..I have like, 2 things I wanna happen before this is over, but they'll probably take 2 or 3 more chapters...I can't believe how long this is getting, I usually try to keep it shorter..._**

**_disclaimer: Umm...I don't think I own anything...what do you think??????_**

* * *

I open my eyes and it's like trying to see through a water bottle. Everything is blurry. Then I realize it's because there's water running into my eyes. 

It must've rained out here. I'm soaked.

I wipe my eyes with my wrist and look around.

I'm still on Jake's grave. I fell asleep _on top of _Jake's grave. But it's all dry. Everything else is bone dry...but I'm soaking wet.

I get up and feel dizzy, so I stick out my hand to stead myself with the tombstone in front of me.

Something salty runs into my mouth and I realize, it's not water in my eyes. It's sweat.

I must be sick. I feel like I'm on fire.

After wiping more sweat out of my eyes, I head towards the gate. It should be easier to get out now that it's light out.

I stumble through the tombstones all around me and stub my toe on one so old I can't read it.

Back at my hotel room, I turn the ceiling fan on high and turn up the AC. I strip down to my underwear and lay down on the bed, on top of the sheets.

At the point right before I'm about to fall asleep, when you notice everything going on around you, but are too disoriented to actually open your eyes or move, I feel sick.

I've probably felt this way for a while. My mind has been crammed for weeks now, with my parents, Daken, Avery, Jake...Jake's death. It's like having blinders on. You notice what's going on in front of you...but everything else you can't distinguish.

I have to vomit.

After emptying about everything I've eaten in the past week, I sit down on the floor in the bathroom. It feels warm.

Once I'm sure there's nothing else to throw up, aside from my large intestine, I turn the water on in the bath tub. As cold as it gets.

With my eyes closed, I listen to the tub fill up.

It takes forever.

Once it's halfway full, I slowly stand up. It takes all the energy I have to get up, so I don't bother undressing the rest of the way, and just slide into the bath tub.

The water feels cool. Not cold enough, but I'd probably half to lay in a freezer for that.

I close my eyes and submerge myself in the water. I blow bubbles before coming back up.

I lay in the water for about ten minutes before draining the water.

In the remaining inch of water, I close my eyes and fall asleep.

I wake up feeling like there's something in my stomach fighting it's way out and lean over the side of the tub. I pull myself up by grabbing a hold of the toilet. I puke again and slide back into the tub, where I just close my eyes.

I'm starting to feel cold, and realize I've quit sweating. This is probably a good sign. Just, the flu or something. I lay still, waiting for my head to stop throbbing. I still feel dizzy, probably from moving so fast.

Eventually I get up, towel off, and lay down in bed. It's dark outside, which means I slept in the bath tub for a long time.

I fall asleep again, and when I wake up, I still feel tired.

For the next few days, I get out of bed only to let the maid changes the sheets and to eat. As much as I want to keep my stomach empty, I know I have to eat something.

I feel more tired than I ever have. It's probably just everything that's happened to me catching up.

Eleven days after the funeral, I still don't have the energy to get up an go home. I've been throwing up for days.

On the twelfth day, I decide to take a walk. Maybe if I get up and move around, I'll have the energy to go home.

I get dressed in the morning and head down the hall, feeling a little dizzy.

I stumble through town for a couple hours, constantly taking my sweatshirt off and putting it back on.

Around lunch time I start feeling sick again, and sit down on the steps of an antique shop. I close my eyes, everything is too bright.

I feel like my head is spinning, and clamp my hands around it.

"You ok?" Somebody asks. I blink and look up at him. He's blurry and I can't see him properly for a couple seconds.

"Ummm...yeah...I just..." I say, getting up and wiping sweat from my face.

I stumble down the steps, before I find myself looking right into the face of Jake's dad.

"Mr. Ryan?" I whisper, still trying to stand up straight. I feel drunk.

I don't exactly remember what being drunk was like, but this is how I imagine it felt.

"I know you...you were at Jake's funeral..."He said.

"Yeah...I...my name's-"

"Starts with an M...Milky...or something like that."

"Yeah...something like...that." I said, running my fingers through my sweaty hair.

"You and Jake dated...right after he started going to public school."

"Umm...yeah, we, uh..." Why can't I get a whole sentence out?

"Are you sure you're ok? You look sick." Mr. Ryan tells me.

"Yeah, I just...need to eat...it's pretty hot out here...I should probably...go."

He gives me a weird look and asks,

"Are you sure? I was just thinking it was cold...I was gonna go home for a sweatshirt."

"No, I just...I better go." I stumbled in the other way, noticing a tear in Mr. Ryan's eye as I pass him. He wipes it away and goes into the shop as I leave.

I decide to head back to the hotel and take another nap, but on the way, I start feeling bad again, and end up getting sick in the bushes outside the front door.

I stop at the front desk and get something for my stomach before sitting down on the floor in the elevator.

People get on and off as I head up, all staring at me. I ignore them.

I head towards my room and lay down on the bed, still feeling sick, my head still throbbing.

I finally quit sweating and feel better for a day or two, but when I get sick again, I decide to see a doctor.

No matter how much I hate them, I probably should see one.

I make an appointment for the following day and climb back into bed.

I walk into the doctor's office ten minutes before my appointment and sit down in the waiting room.

I close my eyes and get shaken awake by a nurse.

"Are you Miley Stewart?" She asks.

"...Yeah." I answer, after blinking until she came into focus.

"Follow me." She says, and leads me down the hallway. I can finally walk without stumbling, which is actually pretty unlucky considering I'm at the doctor's office.

She let's me sit down and tells me to wait for the doctor.

Five minutes later, she comes in. She's a short Asian woman wearing high heels, and I could hear her coming down the hallway before she got there. She looks to be about 35. She's beautiful but does_ not _look like she wants to be here.

She just looks at me, so I explain to her how I've been feeling.

She nods, and scribbles on her clipboard occasionally, just listening to me.

She pulls her bottom lip into her mouth and nods one last time.

"Well...we'll do some tests..." She starts mumbling and I just agree.

She tells me to go to the lab and points me in that direction.

I sit in a chair watching sick children hitting each other while their parents get their subscriptions from the pharmacy across the hallway.

I start feeling sick again, and close my eyes for a moment.

Almost ten minutes later, I open my eyes just in time to see a Lab technician, who then calls my name.

She performs several tests on me, and sends me back to the waiting room, where I sit for at least twenty minutes, before a nurse with a fake smile comes in and leads me to an office across from the room I had seen the doctor in.

She leaves and I look around the office. It's very organized, but there are several childrens books lying on the radiator. Maybe the doctor has kids.

I'm glad she's not _my_ mom. Even though it'd be nice to have one.

I can hear the doctor's heels coming down the hallway, and the door swings open, her shoes entering the room before her.

She's got on the same fake smile the nurse had.

I'm beginning to hate smiling people.

I wish she'd just tell me what was wrong with me.

The doctor, I still don't know her name, slowly click-clacks her way over to her desk. She sits down and locks her fingers together. She sets them down on the desk and looks at me.

I feel like a first grader in the principal's office.

I watch her hands for a couple seconds.

She sighs, and shifts in her chair.

"Miss Stewart." She says.

I look up at her.

She's still wearing that fake smile. Maybe it's not fake. Maybe she actually smiles like that.

I look at her hands again.

She sighs again, which tells me she'd rather be doing something much more exciting.

I want to go hom and take another bath.

She sighs one last time, and I look up at her.

"Miss Stewart..." She repeats.

* * *

**_ok, I'm actually surprised I updated this, I kinda wanted to work on one of my other stories...well, anyways, REVIEW!!! _**

**_I appologize for how short this is...I just can't seem to get my chapters long enough..._**


	22. Chapter 22

**_Ok, so I was trying to stay away from this story for a while, so I could work on some less serious stuff...but it didn't really work out, so I decided to write this instead..._**

The doctor looked at me sympathetically. She shifted her weight and her chair squeaked.

"You have quite the hospital record." She picked up a piece of paper and started reading it.

"Gunshot wound...that led to a coma...injuries sustained by rape, including a head injury, that was, at the time, considered to be a mild one...you birthed a child from the said rape...a stabbing...multiple psychological examinations..." She looked up at me.

"I already know this." I told her, wondering what she was getting at. I really hated this doctor.

"I can honestly tell you this is my least favorite part of being a doctor." She told me, moving onto a new subject.

"Could you just tell me what's wrong with me?" I asked her, getting irritated. I was starting to feel nauseous and the room was spinning.

The doctor was silent for a minute, and then she continued.

"I couldn't tell you why you are just now experiencing all these symptoms at once...nausea, headaches, loss of appetite, dizziness, vomiting..."

"Can you please tell me what these are symptom _of?" _I asked, telling myself _Please don't puke on her, don't puke on her..._

"I'm not going to use the correct terms for this, because I believe it's less scary that way, and also because I can't exactly remember them..." She said, before smiling.

I stared at her, wondering how she could possibly smile at a time like this.

"I'm sorry. I'm procrastinating."

_Ya think?_

She set her hands on the table and started tapping her fingers. She picked up a pen, set it down, picked it up, set it down again. Her hands went down to her lap, and she told me,

"...You have cancer."

I think my lungs stopped working. The room stopped spinning for a minute, but I felt even more nauseous than before. I couldn't believe it. This didn't happen to people like me. Why did everything happen to me? I felt like throwing up, and wasn't trying not to anymore.

_Not that...anything but that...She's lying..._

"According to your file, which I had faxed over a few hours ago, when you woke from your coma you were told that you had sustained an injury to your brain. It was only a concussion, but the doctors told you to be careful, correct?"

I nodded.

"Well, the doctor were wrong...you had brain cancer...it wasn't bad at the time...it remained in the section of your brain that allows you to tell the difference between reality...and imagination...from what we can tell, it only recently started spreading..."

"Oh god." I said, before covering my mouth. I was going to be sick.

The doctor handed me a small trash can, and I vomited into it.

"No...no...no...no no no no no..." I started crying, and set my head on the desk. I covered my ears with my hands and whispered to myself.

"No, no, no."

Before I knew it, I was rocking back and forth in the chair, still whispering to myself. Not only did I have cancer, now my psychological problems were getting worse.

The doctor got up and stood behind me. She patted me on the shoulder. Obviously she couldn't think of anything more comforting to do. She wasn't much help. I would've been better off without her telling me anything.

"It's not too late." She told me. "If you get treatment right away, you can fight this."

"I don't want to fight." I whispered, before vomiting into the trash can again.

The doctor prescribed me some medication to help with the dizziness, nausea, and lack of energy, and I left without thanking her.

I went back to the hotel, took the medicine, and turned the shower on. I sat in the tub, fully clothed, with the water spraying into my face. The feel of my wet clothes, plastered to my body, made me think of Jake though, and soon, water wasn't the only thing running down my face.

If I filled the tub up, maybe I could just, drown myself. It'd be a quicker way to die. It's thoughts like this though, that make me feel like a horrible person. It has become a regular thing for me though, for the past four years.

I was crying so hard now that my stomach was heaving. I didn't want to puke any more than I had to, so I tried to calm down, by thinking of something else.

Millions of things I could've said to Ben, but didn't, swam through my head. There were _so _many things. I should've thought it through before going there. What did I learn anyways?

That he was dying? I already knew what.

That he felt the tiniest bit of remorse that was so uncharacteristic? Maybe I already knew, somewhere, that he had felt that way. We were now inflicted with the same disease. We had something in common once again, other than a terrible crime and some marriage vows.

Is this how he's been feeling? Even after all he did...I'm not sure I'd want even _him _to suffer like this. It shows how bad I feel, for me to say something like that.

I shouldn't have gone to the prison. I should've stayed home. Maybe then...Jake wouldn't have...NO. I won't think about it.

...It was all my fault. If I hadn't gone...Jake wouldn't have gone to New York with me...he wouldn't be...

Oh no. What if I _did _kill him? Of the few things I know about brain cancer, I know that it effects memory. The doctor said it had affected my ability to tell the difference between reality and things I imagine. Maybe I...no, I couldn't have...I could never kill anyone...no matter how screwed up I was.

I need to think about something else.

Like what?

Avery. How could I have been so ignorant...I should've been even a little bit suspicious. But he was so...I don't know...mysterious?

How could I have been so stupid?

Why didn't I think something was up when he wouldn't let me meet his parents? Maybe I thought they were dead...but he could've told me that. Why didn't he trust me? He was constantly telling me he loved me...maybe he knew I was only saying it because I felt guilty. I didn't really mean it when I said it to him.

But Jake...no. Not again, I'm not thinking about that. It has nothing to do with Avery.

No, it has _everything _to do with Avery. It was him, I know it.

I was so stupid. How could I have associated myself with a murderer?

I need to get some sleep.

I got out of the bath tub, and much to the relief of all the fish, I turned off the water. I toweled myself off and went to bed, still damp.

The medicine I had taken made it hard for me to get any sleep, so I decided to walk around for a while.

I ended up in the cemetery again, laying on top of Jake's grave. I told him how my day had gone, crying again.

"I'll be joining you soon." I announced to his tombstone, which, by now, was littered with flowers, cards, and pictures of Jake himself, all from fans, except for a card from his dad. I turned all the pictures over so I wouldn't have to look at them. I didn't feel like I should read the card though, so I didn't. I did notice, however, that it was filled with words.

That tear I had seen the day before was probably one of the first Mr. Ryan had cried in a very long time. He cared about his son more than we both had thought. If only Jake was here to see how many people loved him.

But If he were alive...people wouldn't show they're emotions. It's amazing how much losing someone brings out a person's emotions.

I've had too much experience with that.

It started raining, but I continued to talk to someone that probably couldn't here me, let alone reply.

I sat on the grave for a couple hours, before a security guard told me I had to leave. He was angry at first, but when he saw how sick I looked, he just told me politely that it was after hours, it was raining, and I shouldn't be there.

I left the cemetery and wandered around town for a while, and ended up on the very edge of town. I sat for a while on a bench at a bus stop that looked as if it had been abandoned years ago.

Much to my surprise, a greyhound pulled up, and let off one person. It was an old lady, probably getting ready for her funeral. God know I should be getting ready for mine.

The lady waddled off, and I looked at the bus.

Without bothering to check out of my hotel, pick up my things, or return the rental car, I got on the bus, with nothing but $146.74 on a debit card my dad had given me for my 17th birthday, my pills, the soaked clothes I was wearing, some chapstick, and a piece of paper, folded up in my pocket, with names of highly recommended Oncologists in Tennessee, that I wasn't planning on going to see.

I sat next to a pregnant girl, who looked to be, maybe, 16. She offered me a towel she had been holding, and I dried myself off with it.

She looked unhappy, but I would trade places with this girl in a second if I had the chance.

I stared at her for a minute, and thought to myself.

_I had already gone through that by the time I was her age._

She smiled at me, and I turned to stare at the front of the seat in front of me.

Most of these people were running from their problems.

I was running to mine.

**_dun dun dun...I love doing that lol...not almost killing people by giving them cancer, I meant the dun dun dun thing..._**


	23. Chapter 23

**_Wow, it's been like, forever...not really, just like, two weeks or whatever, but you know what I mean...maybe. Anyways, here we go. This is going to be a long chapter, since I really wanna finish it... I was gonna make this into two chapters and add something else, but I didn't...I apologize for the language, but hey, you'd be mad if you found out your boyfriend was a murderer!!! _**

_**Disclaimer: Last I knew, I owned nothing...but then again, I **am** insane.**_

I traced the pattern on the back of the seat in front of me for about an hour before I closed my eyes.

I didn't sleep. I_ couldn't _sleep. Not now. Now was _not _the time.

I just wanted that girl to think I was asleep. Leave me alone for a while.

After another hour, I could hear the girl next to me flipping the pages of something. A book? No. It was a magazine. I opened my eyes, and "ta da!" It was Us Weekly.

And just guess who was on the cover. Me!

The girl noticed I was staring, and said,

"Hey."

"Hi." I said. I yawned and blinked a couple times for effect.

"Do you...do you think I could see that...when you're done?" I asked her. I wasn't so sure I wanted to read it. But I wanted to know what they were saying about me.

"Oh, yeah, I'm done anyways." She handed me the magazine, and I looked at the front.

"HANNAH PROVED INNOCENT?" It said. With a question mark. As in, somebody out there still believed I did it.

"If she really had nothing to do with it, why is she hiding?" The magazine asked, in smaller letters. These words were overlapping this huge picture of me. It was one of the photos from that photo shoot with Nigel so long ago. It really wasn't that bad of a picture. But what I wouldn't give to be back on those crates with splinters in my butt. Everything was good then. Except for the splinters.

My boyfriend wasn't a murderer. Well, he was, but I hadn't known at the time.

Nobody wondered where I was. I was no longer on the covers of magazines, after months of people wondering.

Jake. Jake was still alive. That was what made my life perfect.

"You ok?" The pregnant girl asked me. She was looking over my shoulder at the cover of the magazine. I nodded

"She's so pretty." The girl, whose name I had yet to find out, commented.

"I wish I was her. Then I wouldn't have _this_." She motioned to her stomach and sighed.

"No you don't. You're lucky. You don't have to deal with cancer, with your murdering boyfriend, who so happens to be the person who most likely killed the guy you love. You don't have a kid at home that barely knows you. Your parents aren't more interested in a rapist rotting in jail than you." I wanted to scream this at her, but I didn't.

Thoughts of Avery floated through my head. And Jake. New York, Illinois, even Malibu. My whole life sped through my head.

There were two memories that stuck out though.

One was that alcohol induced moment of insanity with Avery that I hadn't managed to remember until now. I didn't want to anymore. I wanted it to go away. It was making me sick.

At about the time I felt like throwing up, memories of Jake and I took the place of that nightmare. Thinking about it made me think about what kind of person I was. Tuesday with Avery...Saturday with Jake.

"You ok?" The girl repeated.

"I just...I feel like such a whore right now." I admitted. Sitting next to this pregnant teenage girl, _I _felt like a whore. What was wrong with me?

Oh, right. Cancer.

The nameless girl stared at me, and smirked.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-" I started to apologize.

"It's ok. I know what I am." She interrupted.

"I'm sure you're not as bad as you think."

"I could say the same for you." She said.

I wanted desperately to laugh at this girl. If only she knew what she was saying.

"I'm Miley." I told her instead.

"Oh...that's an interesting name...I'm Ellaine." That was what she said. Pretty much the same as everyone else.

Oh what an interesting name. Such a beautiful name. I've never heard that one before. Miley? That's a weird name. That's very...unique.

I wish my name was Betty. Or Brenda. Susan. Alice. Anything else. I wish I was _somebody _else. An entirely different person. I wish I was Ellaine. She has it easy. Sure she's going to have a baby before the restrictions on her driver's license are even taken away, but besides that, she can be normal.

I went back to the magazine. I flipped a couple pages and found the table of contents. Page twenty three. Pages twenty-three and twenty-four were a huge collage, filled with what was possibly every picture of Hannah ever taken.

Hannah Montana

Mourning or Murdering?

It made me laugh to look at it. Do I seriously look like a murderer? I'm blonde! Aren't blondes supposed to be stupid? That _is_ a major stereotype, but still, I'm a blonde pop star!! All the other ones weren't smart enough to pull something like that off, what makes them think I could?

I blinked the anger out of my eyes and started reading the article.

_One month ago, a tragedy like no other hit the entertainment world. It was announced that beloved actor, Jake Ryan, had been found dead in a Manhattan hotel room. At the time in question, Jake was known to be spending the weekend in New York with none other than world famous pop star, Hannah Montana, who so happened to be an ex girlfriend of Jake's, that had come back into his life at about the same time she came back into everybody else's._

_Rumors flew for the three years Hannah Montana was missing. Was she dead? Pregnant? Kidnapped? Mentally Ill? Or just plain tired of the music industry? Nobody knows for sure what the reason was. Montana refused to talk about why she had left. All she cared to share was that she was back. Hannah's 'big comeback' didn't turn out as planned though, as she lost consciousness in the middle of an interview on "Hey Hey L.A." After that incident, Hannah stayed off the Hollywood scene for a while._

_Hannah's next infamous appearance fueled the "Mentally Ill" rumors, as she was seen with a friend running through a Kohl's parking lot wearing a pair of red shorts and a purple t-shirt with bleach stains down the front. Inside the store, Hannah spent $143, before leaving the store with another friend. Jake Ryan. _

_According to the desk clerk, Gregory Drake, at a Holiday Inn in Manhattan, Jake Ryan came into the hotel carrying a sleeping brunette teenage girl with a blonde girl following. The trio checked into two rooms on the fifth floor. The next day, the blonde left, and Jake was left alone with his sleeping friend. The morning after, the brunette left too. _

_Later that night there were complaints of loud noises coming from the room, but no action was taken. Jake Ryan was then seen leaving the hotel with Hannah Montana in tow, the next day. The two spent the heavily photographed day in a park in central Manhattan, before going back to the hotel._

_This is where nobody is sure what exactly happened. In the early hours of May 17th, Hannah was seen getting into a car in the hotel parking lot, looking as if she was in somewhat of a hurry. By noon, the police were called to the hotel, after the family in the room beneath Ryan's complained to the front desk of a spreading stain in the ceiling of their room. The desk clerk checked out the room and immediately dialed 911. According to an anonymous source, Ryan was found with his throat slashed and for a reasons we can only guess, the word "thief" carved into his stomach._

_Usually, police use evidence at the scene to try to find a suspect, so people wondered when they went after Hannah. Most thought it was just a coincidence. Maybe the actual murderer had waited until she left._

_According to another anonymous source, a single blonde hair had been found wrapped perfectly around the knife handle and left on a desk. DNA was not of any use, because the hair appeared to have been cut off, but scientist were able to discover that the hair was coated in chemicals not unlike the kind you'd find at a wig factory. _

_So the question is: Is Hannah the murderer? Does she really wear a wig? If so, Why? Is she secretly bald?_

_And why is she hiding it from us?_

I tossed the magazine at Ellaine, not believing that they could turn an article about murder into something about a bald pop star. What about the way he died though? Was that fabricated, or did it really happen that way? Thief...

I sighed, this article only proved my suspicions.

Ellaine asked to go to the bathroom, so I let her out. She had no problem crawling over me when she thought I was asleep. While she was gone, I popped a couple pills into my mouth and closed my eyes, trying to actually sleep this time.

Over the next day, I discovered that luckily, this bus actually _was _headed in the direction I was going. I hadn't really cared at the time I boarded where the bus was going, but now it seemed like an important part of my plan, that had been overlooked.

Not that I actually had a_ plan_. I was just going to go home, so I could die of cancer there. It seemed like my plan would work when I was dropped at the airport. I got in my car, went home, and immediately went to bed. I took some sleeping pills on account of the pills making it hard for me to sleep. I could be mixing medicines that could kill me, but I really didn't care. I actually hoped I didn't want to wake up. I did though, an that's when reality sunk in.

I cried for hours and hours, screaming into my pillow. I was going to die. If not now, someday in the near future. I couldn't fight this forever. Even if I actually tried.

I laid in bed for hours, before the phone rang. In about fifteen minutes, Linda and my dad appeared in my doorway.

"Sweety," Linda whispered, looking like she was trying not to cry, "The prison called, and they said that...that he only has a couple days left...so I was gonna go...say goodbye...and your dad wanted to come with...so..."

"We'll be gone for a little while...are you gonna be ok?" My dad asked.

I looked at Linda, she obviously wanted to cry. He _was _her son after all. I understood that. No matter what he did, she still loved him. I understood that too.

"Yeah...I'll be fine." I sat up in bed and wiped my eyes.

"Would you be ok with Daken, or should we..."

"You take him...I can't deal with it right now." I told them. Linda nodded and left the room. Daken appeared behind her and when dad left, he came into the room. I moved so that I was laying perpendicular to my bed, with my hands hanging off.

He came up close to me and tried to climb up onto my bed. I sat up and helped him. He stared at me for a minute, before kissing me on the cheek and climbing down, just like that.

I closed my eyes and thought about him for a little while. I hadn't been much of a mother to him. Or sister, like I had tried to pretend. I felt guilty now.

I got out off bed while they were packing, and grabbed my video camera. I had to explain myself to the world. They needed to understand. I didn't want them to remember me the way they did now. As a murderer.

So I got out my wig and sat back in my bed with the video camera.

And I explained it all. Everything.

The wig, the reason I left...what happened with Jake...why they probably wouldn't hear from me again...who would be the one to do it...why he would do it...how I thought he would do it.

I stopped recording and took out the tape. I grabbed a permanent marker and wrote V.I.P. - for fans.

I hid it under my bed.

If I were to die the way I thought I would, the police would find it there while investigating my murder. I hope it helped.

I laid back down in bed, and fell asleep again, as the sun slid down the walls and out of sight.

When I woke up, it was dark out. Dad, Linda and Daken probably left hours ago. I heard something downstairs though.

I shouldn't go investigate. No Miley, don't do it.

I did it anyways. I almost tripped at the bottom of the stairs when I saw what the source of the noise was.

"Oh, hey, when'd you get back? I kept calling, but your parents said you were still in North Carolina...for a funeral."

"Oh yeah, I'm sure you knew about that, you're the reason I had to go!" I yelled at him. I didn't want to lose control, but I couldn't help it.

"Excuse me?"

"I know you did it Avery." I said, calmly. He took a step closer and I screamed.

"YOU FUCKING KILLED HIM!!! YOU DID IT!!! YOU HEARTLESS ASSHOLE!!!" he knew I was mad just from my choice of words. Even if I hadn't screamed them at him, if i'd been laughing. As much as I wished it wasn't true, Avery knew me. He knew I only cussed like this when I was really mad, and I was beyond mad. There was no word for how mad I was.

I started walking backwards, into the kitchen. He followed me, but stayed at a distance. He was restraining himself.

"I know about your family too. Dennis told me. I'm sure you're gonna go finish him off now, aren't you? Because you, are a heartless, cold blooded, murdering, ASSHOLE!!!!!"

He took another step towards me, and I picked up a knife that was sitting on the counter.

"Stay away! If you take one more step, I swear to god I'll stab you!" I yelled at him. He just smiled. Smiled!!

"What is wrong with you? You're a fucking murderer! You're gonna get caught!! You will. You're not gonna get away with it this time. There is no reason at all for you to be smiling."

"Please don't yell at me Miley," He whispered, "I don't wanna do it."

"I'M CAN YELL AT YOU ALL THE HELL I WANT!!!" I screamed at him.

"Kill me, I really don't care. I'm gonna die anyways. I have cancer. Isn't that great? I'm sure you're disappointed. You won't get all the credit for this one."

He lunged at me, and I moved at the last minute. He hit the wall and crumpled. He stood up looking more angry than I had ever thought he could. I ran to the stairs, for some stupid reason, and threw every little thing I passed down at him as he chased me.

I locked myself in the bathroom, and held the knife tightly in my hand. I could hear him beating on each door as he passed it. He came to the bathroom, and I could feel the door vibrating as he hit it.

"I know you're in there Miley. You don't need to hide."

"I'm not hiding. I'm giving you some exercise." I replied, breathless.

He was quiet for a second.

"I had my reasons. My family deserved it. They didn't approve of me. They thought there was something wrong with me. So I killed them. They didn't bother me anymore. I sold all the furniture...got rid off all memories. I believe you found my mother's mirror though...in California...and you met my sister in the bathtub...my brother, crawling around like the animal he was. and the neighbor boy...Jason. I bet you didn't like them just as much as me!!"

He beat on the door again, and it splintered. Great. Now I was locked in a bathroom. I never wanted to die in a bathroom.

"I did it for you. He stole you from me. He needed to go." Avery explained, as he beat at the door again. It started splintering even more.

"Did you really think that by murdering the person I loved, I would like you more? Because if you did, you are SO FUCKING DERANGED, it's not even funny!!!!" I screamed at him. It wasn't funny. Nothing about this situation was funny. It was SO FAR from funny.

I was making him angry. The door was breaking. I was gonna die, right at this moment. In my smelly bathroom. I wrapped my fingers around the knife, and the door buckled in. Right as he came at me, I struck him with the knife, and stabbed him in the stomach. He groaned, and tried to pull it out. While he was busy, I ran past him, and towards the stairs.

About halfway down, I could hear his footsteps on the top of the staircase. I thought about just jumping, but while I was thinking, he grabbed my feet, and drug me back upstairs. Every step hurt really bad. I just wanted it to stop.

And it would. Eventually.

He wrapped his hands around my sides and pulled me up. He pushed me right up against the wall and got it my face. His hands were on each side of me, and I was inhaling his breath. This would've been nice months ago, if his breath didn't reek of onions and if he wasn't determined to murder me right here.

"I loved you." He said, calmly. "I loved you, and you went off to New York, and you just started fucking Jake-fucking-Ryan!!" He yelled in my face.

"How'd you know?" I asked him quietly.

"Know _what?" _He spit in my face.

"About Hannah." I replied as I felt his spit drip onto my shoulder. It was disgusting.

"Ahh...Hannah...did you _really _think I was just going to let you run off every week without telling me why? I did some research. It's really not that hard to figure out. If you just look at a picture, you can tell it's you."

"What else did you figure out about me?" I asked. I tried to remain calm.

"I found out all I needed. I saw those pictures, in all the magazines. The rest of the world was so excited, but I was angry. I had to do something. So I did."

"You murdered him!! There was no reason to do that!!!" I yelled in his face.

"Maybe not...but it _is _a reason to kill you. I don't want to, but now that you've learned so much, I kind of have to. I'm really going to regret this Miley."

He focused his eyes on my face, and while he was distracted, I shoved him off of me. I slid out of his grip and ran down the hall. He caught up to me and grabbed ahold of my shoulders. They were forcibly contracted, and I was forced against the stair railing.

He looked into my eyes with the most evil expression. If I wasn't scared before, I was now. He would kill me before daylight. He would get exactly what he wanted. He would see my blood running all over. It would surround his feet, and soak into his shoes. After he was finished, he would smile, erase all signs he'd been there, and leave, like nothing had happened.

I looked into his satanic eyes and spat,

"I hate you."

He grabbed ahold of me and whispered,

"Now see, that's the difference between us, because, you see..."

He wrapped his arms around my neck.

This was it. I was going to die. Surprisingly, I didn't care as much as I thought I would. Sure I was crying my eyes out, but I knew it would come to this eventually. I didn't really want to die. I wanted to live, but that wouldn't happen for me. It was either this, or slowly and painfully. I wish I'd said goodbye to my family though. They were who I was scared for. I wouldn't want to be left here.

And just like in my nightmares...

"I love you, babe." Avery said.

Before:

SNAP.

I was falling, falling.

I hit the ground and crumpled like a broken tea cup, the "tea" that was my blood, was pouring from my mouth and ears.

I was leaving now, and there was nobody to listen to me. No one to hear my story

The only person that would listen was on the other side, and it was too late now, I would soon meet him again.

I had crossed over.

There was no chance I would be able to tell my story.

There was nobody that mattered left to listen.

**_Ta da!!!!!! I should definitely not feel happy about this...I'm just glad I'm finished...by the way, back when I was going to do the third one, I was still planning on ending it like this...I'm still not sure about the next one though...tell me what you think...would it be better to end it here?_**


	24. Sequel News

_**Hellooo my long lost readers. I bet at least half of you haven't heard from me in a while.  
Anyway, I'm here to talk about something! Yes, amazing, I know.  
**_

_**So seeing as this series is, and will always be, the most popular thing I have posted (that says a lot about how much I suck) I've thought about the sequel to this. I didn't like the one I posted before, and I've been thinking about making an actual, completely different, multi-chapter third one, in Daken's point of view. So tell me what you think about that, okay?**_


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